Abstract

Mettur an industrial town is located in Salem district of Tamil Nadu, India. The major industries, namely; Chemplast, The Madras Aluminum Company and Mettur Thermal Power Plant are located in Mettur town. In addition, several chemical industries are situated on the banks of the River Cauvery as part of Small Industries Development Corporation (SIDCO) industrial estate. With this background, the present study attempts to investigate the usefulness of multivariate statistical analysis for the assessment of complex data sets to get better information about an influence of various parameters on groundwater chemistry and heavy metal concentrations. Groundwater samples were collected during pre-monsoon (June 2013) and post-monsoon (February 2014) seasons and analysed for heavy metals and other hydro chemical characteristics. The results of the multivariate statistical analysis show that the sampling site have different characteristics in terms of heavy metals studied and indicate that each region receives pollution from different sources. The high level of some of the heavy metals and hydrochemical recorded in certain pollution packets ultimately implies an alarming situation in the viewpoint of health risk. The notable differences in the quality of groundwater between the sampling sites indicate possible land use influences.

Keywords

Groundwater, Pollution, Multivariate statistics, Industrial pollution, Agrochemicals