Evaluation of groundwater suitability for different applications in the area of West Assiut Power Plant, Egypt

Water used for electric power production and different purposes nowadays in Egypt is from traditional sources like the Nile River and non-traditional sources such as seawater, excessively hard or brackish groundwater, poor quality surface waters, and wastewater. All these sources commonly require treatment with high-quality technologies before use. In the area of the West-Assiut Combined Cycle Power Plant (WACCPP), in Upper Egypt, groundwater is used as the source for demineralized water production for this power plant and it is used in other applications as well. In this paper, the quality of this groundwater and its suitability for different purposes are examined. Many chemical properties were examined such as corrosive ratio, water action according to the relation between pH and alkalinity, Kelly's ratio, sodium absorption ratio, soluble sodium percent, the relation between EC and Na %, residual sodium carbonate, permeability index, potential salinity, magnesium adsorption ratio. The water pollution index rating scale was calculated for evaluating the water suitability for different purposes. Results showed that water is unsuitable for most purposes, and hence, polluted water is used in WACCPP.