IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v17y2020i24p9373-d462185.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Simulation-Based Solutions Reducing Soil and Groundwater Contamination from Fertilizers in Arid and Semi-Arid Regions: Case Study the Eastern Nile Delta, Egypt

Author

Listed:
  • Ismail Abd-Elaty

    (Department of Water and Water Structures Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Zagazig University, Zagazig 44519, Egypt)

  • Lorenzo Pugliese

    (Department of Agroecology, Aarhus University, 8830 Tjele, Denmark)

  • Martina Zelenakova

    (Department of Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Civil Engineering, Technical University of Kosice, 04200 Kosice, Slovakia)

  • Peter Mesaros

    (Department of Construction Technology and Management, Faculty of Civil Engineering, Technical University of Kosice, 04200 Kosice, Slovakia)

  • Abdelaziz El Shinawi

    (Environmental Geophysics Lab (ZEGL), Geology Department, Faculty of Science, Zagazig University, Zagazig 44519, Egypt)

Abstract

Intensive agriculture requires increasing application of fertilizers in order to sustain food production. Improper use of these substances in combination with increasing seawater intrusion results in long-term and nonpoint soil and groundwater contamination. In this work, a 3-D groundwater and solute transport numerical model was created to simulate the effect of excessive fertilizers application along the Bahr El Baqar drain system, in the eastern Nile Delta, Egypt. The geotechnical properties of the soils, hydrologic parameters, and unconfined compressive strength were determined at different sites and used as input parameters for the model. Model results showed that silty clay soils are able to contain the contaminations and preserve the groundwater quality. Nevertheless, sandy soils primarily located at the beginning of the Bahr El Baqar drain allow leakage of fertilizers to the groundwater. Thus, fertilizer application should be properly managed in the top sandy layers to protect the groundwater and soil, as increasing aquifer by excess irrigation water increased the groundwater contamination in confined layers due to the high value of cumulative salt for the current situation while the unconfined zone decreased groundwater and soil contamination. A mass transport 3-D multi-species (MT3D) model was set to identify the optimal measure to tackle soil and groundwater contamination along the Bahr El-Baqar drain system. A potential increase of the abstraction rates in the study area has a positive impact in reducing the transfer of fertilizer contamination to groundwater while it has a negative impact for soil contamination. The scenario analysis further indicated that the installation of a drainage network decreases the groundwater and soil contamination. Both solutions are potentially effective for protection against nonpoint contamination along the Bahr El Baqar drain system. However, a more sustainable management approach of fertilizer application is needed to adequately protect the receptors located further downstream in the Nile Delta.

Suggested Citation

  • Ismail Abd-Elaty & Lorenzo Pugliese & Martina Zelenakova & Peter Mesaros & Abdelaziz El Shinawi, 2020. "Simulation-Based Solutions Reducing Soil and Groundwater Contamination from Fertilizers in Arid and Semi-Arid Regions: Case Study the Eastern Nile Delta, Egypt," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(24), pages 1-18, December.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:17:y:2020:i:24:p:9373-:d:462185
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/24/9373/pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/24/9373/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Hany F. Abd-Elhamid & Shaimaa M. Abd-Elmoneem & Gamal M. Abdelaal & Martina Zeleňáková & Zuzana Vranayova & Ismail Abd-Elaty, 2021. "Investigating and Managing the Impact of Using Untreated Wastewater for Irrigation on the Groundwater Quality in Arid and Semi-Arid Regions," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(14), pages 1-17, July.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:17:y:2020:i:24:p:9373-:d:462185. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.