EVALUATION OF SURAFACE WATER IN RIVERNILE AND CANALS FOR IRRIGATION PURPOSES

In this paper we carried out the determination of the different properties of water such as electric conductivity(EC), hydrogen ion concentration (pH), total dissolved salts (TDS), turbidity , major ions as cations ( Ca2+, Mg2+, Na+, K+), anions (CO₃2⁻, HCO₃⁻ ,SO₄2⁻, Cl⁻). The results indicate that an increase in total, temporary and permanent hardness with increasing water salinity in all surface water according to the change of water type from fresh to saline water. This is mainly attributed to the effect of leaching and dissolution of soluble salts leading to the increase of hardness with particular importance to the effect of NaCl concentration on increasing solubility of Ca2+ and Mg2+ in water. This does not exclude the contribution of CO2, influence of salty water and cation exchange process. The results show that the increase in the salinity of river Nile and canals is due to the increase in readily soluble salts (NaCl, Na2SO4, NaHCO3) which is generally less than that of permanent and temporary hardness salts [MgSO4, CaSO4, MgCl2, Mg(HCO3)2 and Ca(HCO3)2].