Effects of Rainfall

Effects of Rainfall.
Water is one of the most valuable resources on Earth. Rainwater fills reservoirs that supply drinking water,
provide a habitat for fish to live, and nourishes the soil with water necessary for vegetation. For growing crops
during the farming season, helps people and animals for harvesting and consumption purposes respectively. It
isbelieved that all the sources of water, rain are the best for use in our homes and also generates tropical
humility.For harvesting. Most importantly, rainfall is ordained.Rain water, however, can also have a negative
effect on the Earth when it causes erosion or when it has a highpH and its characteristic features which are
thunder and lightning. Also, it causes natural disaster which destroysproperties and at times, takes lots of
lives, it causes leaching to such a depth that, plant roots are lost in the
process.
Ground Water
Groundwater is fresh water (from rain or melting ice and snow) that soaks into the soil and is stored in the
tiny spaces (pores) between rocks and particles of soil. Groundwater accounts for nearly 95 percent of the
nation’s fresh water resources. It can stay underground for hundreds of thousands of years, or it can come to
the surface and help fill rivers, streams, lakes, ponds, and wetlands. Groundwater can also come to the surface
as a spring or be pumped from a well. Both of these are common ways we get groundwater to drink. About 50
percent of our municipal, domestic, and agricultural water supply is groundwater.
Groundwater is held in the pore space of sediments such as sands or gravels or in the
fissures of fractured rock such as crystalline rock and limestone. The body of rock or
sediments containing the water is termed an aquifer and the upper water level in the
saturated body is termed the water table. Typically, groundwaters have a steady flow pattern.
Velocity is governed mainly by the porosity and permeability of the material through which
the water flows, and is often up to several orders of magnitude less than that of surface
waters. As a result, mixing is poor.
Aquifer
Where groundwater can move rapidly, such as through gravel and sandy deposits, an aquifer can form. In an
aquifer, there is enough groundwater that it can be pumped to the surface and used for drinking water,
irrigation, industry, or other uses
It is defined as a rock mass, layer or formation which is saturated with groundwater and which by virtue of its
properties is capable of yielding the contained water at economical costs when tapped.
The quality of an aquifer will, therefore, depend both on how much quantity of water a rock formation can
hold per unit volume and at what rate it can yield water when tapped for supplies. It is a storage reservoir and
a transmission conduit at the same time.
Types of aquifer
Two basic types of aquifers are distinguished on the basis of physical conditions under which water can exist in
them:
(a) The unconfined aquifer
It is also called a water-table aquifer, and is the most common type encountered in the field. In this
type, the upper surface of water or the water-table is under atmospheric pressure which may be
acting through the interstices in the overlying rocks. Water occurring in this type of aquifer is called
Free Groundwater. When tapped through a test well, the free water will rise to a level in the well
equivalent to the water table of the area.
(b) The confined aquifer.

It is a rock formation saturated with water and capable of yielding water tapped but unlike
unconfined aquifer, has an overlying confining layer (an impermeable rock mass) that separates it
from the influence of atmospheric pressure. Naturally, water held in this type of aquifer is not
under atmospheric pressure but under a greater pressure due to the confining medium. The upper
surface of water in a confined aquifer (the confined water) is called piezometric surface.
Aquifer Functions:
Aquifers serve as underground reservoirs and distribution systems or conduits at the same time.
Water quality
The quality of groundwater depends on the composition of the recharge water, the interactions between
the water and the soil, soil-gas and rocks with which it comes into contact in the unsaturated zone, and the
residence time and reactions that take place within the aquifer. Therefore, considerable variation can be
found, even in the same general area, especially where rocks of different compositions and solubility occur.
The principal processes influencing water quality in aquifers are physical (dispersion/dilution, filtration and gas
movement), geochemical (complexation, acid-base reactions, oxidation-reduction, precipitation-solution, and
adsorption-desorption) and biochemical (microbial respiration and decay, cell synthesis).
Contamination
Artificial pollution of groundwater may arise from either point or diffuse sources. Some of the more common
sources include domestic sewage and latrines, municipal solid waste, agricultural wastes and manure, and
industrial wastes (including tipping, direct injection, spillage and leakage). The contamination of groundwaters
can be a complex process. Contaminants, such as agricultural chemicals, spread over large sections of the
aquifer recharge area may take decades to appear in the groundwater and perhaps longer to disappear after
their use has ceased.
Processes affecting hazardous substances in groundwater
Advection occurs when contaminants move with the groundwater. This is the main form of contaminant
migration in groundwater.
Sorption occurs when contaminants attach themselves to soil particles. Sorption slows the movement of
contaminants in groundwater, but also makes it harder to clean up contamination.
Biological degradation happens when microorganisms, such as bacteria and fungi, use hazardous substances
as a food and energy source. In the process, contaminants break down and hazardous substances often
become less harmful.

Effects of Rainfall

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Effects of Rainfall.

(b) The confined aquifer.

Processes affecting hazardous substances in groundwater

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