Uranium quantification in groundwater and health risk from its ingestion in Haryana,India

Uranium is a naturally occurring radioactive element which may cause toxicological or radiological hazards to the public if present in drinking water. This study reports the quantification of uranium in groundwater of major towns of the district Fatehabad, Haryana, India. Uranium concentrations ranged between 0.3 and 48 μg L^?1. In 22% of the groundwater samples, uranium concentrations were higher than the World Health Organization maximum permissible limit of 30 µg L^?1. The radiological dose for males was found to be in the range of 4.8?×?10^?4–7.1?×?10^?2 mSv y^?1 and for females 3.5?×?10^?4–5.2?×?10^?2 mSv y^?1. The results showed that due to the ingestion of groundwater in the study area, radiological cancer risk is in the range of 9.1?×?10^?7–1.3?×?10^?4, lower than the risk limit. Uranium ingestion from groundwater varied from 0.02 to 3.5 µg kg^?1 day^?1, which is within acceptable limit.     

Fluoride distribution in groundwater and survey of dental fluorosis among school children in the villages of the Jhajjar District of Haryana,India

Fluoride concentration of groundwater reserves occurs in many places in the world. A critical area for such contamination in India is alluvial soil of the plain region, consisting of five blocks (Jhajjar, Bahadurgarh, Beri, Matanhail, and Sahalawas) of the Jhajjar District adjacent to the National Capital Territory of India, New Delhi. The purpose of this study was to assess the association between water fluoride levels and prevalence of dental fluorosis among school children of the Jhajjar District of Haryana, India. The fluoride content in underground drinking water sources was found to vary in villages. Hence, the villages were categorized as high-fluoride villages (1.52–4.0 mg F/l) and low/normal-fluoride villages (0.30–1.0 mg F/l). The source of dental fluorosis data was school-going children (7–15 years) showing different stages and types of fluorosis who were permanent resident of these villages. The fraction of dental fluorosis-affected children varied from 30% to 94.85% in the high-fluoride villages and from 8.80% to 28.20% in the low/normal-fluoride villages. The results of the present study revealed that there existed a significant positive correlation between fluoride concentration in drinking water and dental fluorosis in high-fluoride villages (r = 0.508; p < 0.001) and insignificant correlation in low-fluoride villages.     

Scenario realism and welfare estimates in choice experiments--a non-market valuation study on the European water framework directive

Using choice experiment data for economic valuation we analyse how disbelief in survey information could affect the retrieved welfare estimates. We distinguish between two types of survey information to the respondents. The first type of information concerns the current environmental status of a water body. This information is provided prior to the valuation questions and the corresponding beliefs in the provided information are also elicited before valuation. The second type of information concerns the proposed improvements in the environmental status of the water body. We find that average welfare measures differ considerably according to whether respondents who disagree with the status quo levels and find proposed scenarios unlikely are included or not.     

Bacteriological study of Upper Lake of Bhopal, India

In order to assess the water quallty of the upper lake of Bhopal (India) after the leakage of methyl isocyanate (MIC) gas from the Union Carbide factory, Bhopal, bacteriological study of the lake water was carried out. Water samples were collected from eight different sampling stations from the eastern, western, northern and southern sides of the lake. The study has revealed that the coliform bacteria are increased (24000/mL) at the onset of summer and are dropped to a minimum (120/mL) during monsoon season against the permissible limit of 100/mL recommended by the World Health Organisation (WHO) for water to be used for drinking purposes. The data collected show that the water quality of the Upper lake is deteriorated and is gradually becoming unfit for drinking.     

Distributional Assumptions in Chance-Constrained Programming Models of Stochastic Water Pollution

In the water management literature both the normal and log-normal distribution are commonly used to model stochastic water pollution. The normality assumption is usually motivated by the central limit theorem, while the log-normality assumption is often motivated by the need to avoid the possibility of negative pollution loads. We utilize the truncated normal distribution as an alternative to these distributions. Using probabilistic constraints in a cost-minimization model for the Baltic Sea, we show that the distribution assumption bias is between 1% and 60%. Simulations show that a greater difference is to be expected for data with a higher degree of truncation. Using the normal distribution instead of the truncated normal distribution leads to an underestimation of the true cost. On the contrary, the difference in cost when using the normal versus the log-normal can be positive as well as negative.     

Evaporative Cooling of Water in a Small Vessel Under Varying Ambient Humidity

Evaporative cooling of water in a small porous clay vessel was studied under controlled humidity conditions. In steady-state experiments performed at an ambient temperature of 23 °C, the cooling effect increased from 4.7 to 8.3 °C as the ambient relative humidity decreased from 60 to 15%. External heat and mass transfer coefficients, estimated from the steady-state measurements, were used in mathematical models to predict the experimentally observed transient temperature variation of the water under ramp changes of the ambient relative humidity. With a prototypical cool chamber containing water tested in Kolkata, India under an ambient temperature of 34.5–35 °C, the cooling effect reached a maximum of 7 °C between 3 and 3:30 PM and then declined to 4.5 °C around 6 PM.