Risk-based prioritization methodology for the classification of groundwater pollution sources

Area of Science:

• Environmental Science
• Hydrogeology
• Water Resource Management

Background:

• Urban water management is a key EU environmental priority facing significant challenges.
• European regulations like the Water Framework Directive (WFD) and Groundwater Directive mandate pollution source identification and risk assessment.
• Protecting groundwater quality is crucial for achieving the 'good quality status' mandated by EU directives.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce a novel risk-based prioritization methodology for groundwater pollution sources.
• To support the development of effective management strategies for achieving good groundwater quality status.
• To provide a framework for ranking contamination sources threatening groundwater quality.

Main Methods:

• The methodology involves hazard analysis, pathway analysis, receptor vulnerability analysis, and relative risk estimation.
• Integration of Geographic Information System (GIS) functionalities and Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA) techniques.
• The approach handles multiple pollution sources and receptors, assessing varying vulnerability levels based on groundwater use.

Main Results:

• The framework successfully identified and ranked contamination sources in an industrialized area near Milan, Italy.
• Three sources were prioritized due to high risks associated with Chromium (VI) and Perchloroethylene.
• The case study demonstrated the methodology's effectiveness in identifying intervention priorities among 32 analyzed sources.

Conclusions:

• The developed risk-based methodology is effective for prioritizing groundwater pollution sources.
• The framework is flexible and adaptable to different environmental contexts and data availability.
• This approach supports informed decision-making for groundwater protection and management strategies.