MIF and AHP methods for Delineation of groundwater potential zones using remote sensing and GIS Techniques in Tirunelveli, Tenkasi District, India

Abstract

The present study aims to identifying the delineation of potential Groundwater Zones is essential for monitoring surface and conserving underground water resources. This study was analysed the morphology of earth surface characteristics such as geomorphology, Lineament Density, lithology, Slope, soil types, land use and land cover, drainage density, Land surface temperature, NDVI, Rainfall and Topographic wetness index (TWI) parameters to delineate the potential groundwater zones. In the present paper applies the Analytical Hierarchical process (AHP) and Multi- influencing factors (MIF) Methods to identify prospective groundwater zones in the Tirunelveli and Tenkasi districts of Tamil Nadu, India. In the AHP Process method, Individual parameters geometric mean and normalized weights were determined using pair-wise matrix analytical method. RS-GIS techniques were used to generate thematic map layers from normalized weights to delineate GWPZs. The GWPZs were classified as Very Low, Low, Medium, High and Very High. The Result shows the GWPZs were identified 3.57%,0.55%,6.62%,58.09% and 31.21% in the Study area for the five classes respectively. In this study, the thematic maps were also prepared by assigning fixed score and weights from the multi-influencing factor (MIF) approach. In the MIF approach, GWPZs were classified into five classes and identified 3.16%,0.33%,2.14%,61.21% and 33.16% in the Study area respectively. GWPZ maps were evaluated for both MIF and AHP techniques using Kappa statistics method with agreement values of 0.77% and 0.72% respectively. This study GIS-RS Method is more proficient and efficient to delineate the Groundwater Potential Zones.