Desalination and Water Treatment 52 (2014) 2724–2733 www.deswater.com March doi: 10.1080/19443994.2013.827775 Salinization of deep groundwater in plain areas of Xinjiang: causes and countermeasures Qiao Lia, Jinlong Zhoua,*, Yinzhu Zhoub, Ruiliang Jiaa aCollege of Water Conservancy and Civil Engineering, Xinjiang Agricultural University, Urumqi 830052, China Tel. +86 13263381574; email: [email protected] bSchool of Water Resources and Environment, China University of Geosciences, Beijing 100083, China Received 12 July 2012; Accepted 7 July 2013 ABSTRACT The salinization of deep groundwater is one of the serious geographical environmental hazards. The present study collected groundwater samples from 60 wells with depth over 100 m in the plain areas of Xinjiang from October to November of 2011. The comparison of hydrochemical data obtained in 2011 and 2003 in the same wells indicated that salinization occurred in a spot-like pattern in Xinjiang. Among the 60 groundwater samples, 20 samples were seriously salinized, which made up to 33.3% of the total wells. Through the analysis of the characteristics of salinization of deep groundwater in this region, four causes of saliniza- tion and four countermeasures to prevent salinization were put forward. Keywords: Plain areas of Xinjiang; Deep groundwater; Salinization 1. Introduction Tacheng Prefecture, Turfan Prefecture, Aksu Prefec- ture, Kashkar Prefecture, Hotan Prefecture and Kizilsu Located in the west of the People’s Republic of Kirgiz Autonomous Prefecture (Kizilsu Prefecture China and in the hinterland of Asian-European Conti- hereafter). With the constant development of economy nent, Xinjiang borders on eight countries with 1/6 of and society, the demand for water resources increases the total area of China. Xinjiang is subdivided into 14 and pollution of surface water is aggravated. Such prefectures and cities: Urumqi, Karamay, Bayingolin phenomena lead to irrational exploitation of ground- Mongolian Autonomous Prefecture (Bayingolin Prefec- water in some areas. For example, the deep ground- ture hereafter), Yili Kazak Autonomous Prefecture water in Kashkar and Aksu tends to become salinized, (Yili Prefecture hereafter), Altay Prefecture, Bortala which has become an increasingly serious geographi- Mongolian Autonomous Prefecture (Bortala Prefecture cal/environmental disaster. hereafter), Changji Hui Autonomous Prefecture In order to understand the situation of Xinjiang’s (Changji Prefecture hereafter), Hami Prefecture, deep groundwater salinization, we collected 60 sam- pling wells with depth over 100 m from 283 ground- water samples, while compiling the Planning of the *Corresponding author. Presented at the Second International Conference on Water Resources Management and Engineering (ICWRME 2012) Zhengzhou, China, 14–16 August 2012 1944-3994/1944-3986 Ó 2013 Balaban Desalination Publications. All rights reserved..