A review on the application of the DRASTIC method in the assessment of groundwater vulnerability

Abstract

Abstract Industrial and municipal wastes, agricultural contamination owing to pesticides and chemical hazards, seawater intrusion in coastal areas, and other factors damage groundwater. In several towns and industrial clusters across India, this is becoming a rising subject of concern. Groundwater is difficult to contaminate, but once contaminated, it is difficult to clean up. It is critical to attain this goal using a variety of aquifer vulnerability assessment approaches. All of these strategies rely on process models as well as statistical or overlay index methodologies. Groundwater vulnerability is a major topic of discussion due to declining groundwater levels and rising contamination, posing a serious threat to the environment and water sources. To identify the risk and to assess the vulnerability, extensive research has been carried out among all the methods based on different parameters and different indexes. The DRASTIC method is one of the most important and accurate of the overlay and index methods for the assessment of groundwater vulnerability. This research study is a systematic analysis of the available research articles on the applications of the DRASTIC and Modified DRASTIC (DRASTIC-L) performance management process on Geographical Information Systems (GIS). This research also reveals research gaps in the various groundwater vulnerability assessment approaches, as well as their limits and hypotheses. This study discovered that integrating GIS with DRASTIC is the most effective and accurate way for determining groundwater vulnerability. In agricultural, arid, semi-arid, and basaltic zones, the modified DRASTIC model also outperforms the traditional DRASTIC model.