Assessment of groundwater potential using integrated method in Dange-Shuni Area, Sokoto State, Nigeria

Abstract

The study evaluated groundwater potential in Dange-Shuni area using integrated methods. Dange-Shuni area is among localities in Sokoto region characterised with a geologic formations that suffered from insufficiency of groundwater, and no information on the appropriate depth to drill because there was little or no research on that aspect. Sixteen VES points were sampled based on geologic formations and surveyed using SAS Terrameter Metre. Based on geology of the area, resistivity layer parameters were categorized from very high to very low groundwater potentials. Thematic layers were weighted in ArcGIS 10.4.1 software. VES data and remote sensing data were analysed using ipi2win and ArcGIS softwares respectively. Factors were weighted according to equal importance criteria using Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP). It shows that different places have different lithology ranging from clay, sandy-clay, sandstone and course-sand in different layer group. From pseudo cross section the result shows profile section of lithological layers from top soil, weathered material, semi weathered material to hard rock in different varying depth. Weighting of all the six factors (Lineament Density, slope, Land Use/Land Cover, soil, Drainage Density and Geology) indicated that lineament line density is having highest weight of 25% and with highest rank of 5. The finding further revealed five groundwater potential zones as very high with 13.79%, high potential with 25.59%,moderate with 53.06% of the total area of the study area, low potentiality is having 6.28% and very low is the least coverage with 1.26% of the total area. The research concluded that if properly exploited very high (13.79%) and high potential zones (25.59%) can take care of the domestic water supply of the rural populace. The research recommends for borehole depth to be greater than 120m in the study area for effective exploitation of the resource.