Estudio de la influencia de las fuentes antropogénicas sobre la calidad del agua de la cuenca media y baja del río Ambato

Abstract

A growing environmental problem is the contamination of the water resource, being a threat to fresh water sources such as rivers and their tributaries, in this sense this research aims to establish the effect of anthropogenic sources on the degree of contamination in five points of the middle and lower basin of the Ambato river by determining ten physicochemical parameters, calculating the water quality index (ICA) and comparing the performance of the sampling process as well as the effect of the location of the study points. The tests were structured in a replicated double division design, taking a sample for each sampling point, and obtaining four replicates per point. The methods consisted of measuring the concentration of physicochemical parameters following the Manual of Standard Methods for the Analysis of Water and Wastewater and the determination of the NSF Water Quality Index. The investigation verified that only four parameters are within the permissible limit: temperature, turbidity, biological oxygen demand and dissolved solids, in addition to this the quality of the water according to the ICA value was regular and poor throughout the middle and lower basin of the By virtue of the results, these denote that sewage and untreated waste from mainly domestic and industrial activities affect the water quality of the Ambato River, which has been affected for years by indiscriminate contamination from various sources.