Abstract
Human activities alter salt concentration of water sources such as lakes, ponds, wetlands and streams, which will have detrimental impacts on water quality and aquatic ecosystems. We developed electrical conductivity (EC)–based sensors to measure salt concentrations in water bodies. We calibrated and validated sensors using standard sodium chloride (NaCl) solutions. Furthermore, we validated sensors in a laboratory (using standard solutions) and field settings. The errors for the laboratory validation varied from 0 to 13% with an average of 6%. We deployed 35 sensors in the Madison County, Illinois, USA and measured high-resolution (15 min) salt concentration for 6 months (December, 2018 to May, 2019) in water bodies in urban stream, parking lot drain, road-side drain, and creek. The average errors between sensor and field measurements were 11% for sensor field validation. Sensors were able to predict salt concentrations in the field settings within a precision level required to quantify salt concentration in water bodies. Therefore, the study would be helpful to monitor the change in salt concentrations in water sources as an impact of human activities benefiting water managers, researchers, and agencies working on water quality and ecosystems.
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Acknowledgments
We would like to acknowledge the Center for Ecohydraulics Research (CER), University of Idaho, and Bob Basham for developing sensors as part of the collaborative research. Furthermore, we would like to thank Region Five District 8, Department of Transportation, Collinsville, IL for granting permission to deploy sensors at road-side drains of inter-state and local highways. Furthermore, SIUE students Victoria Wieseman, Utsav Manandhar, and Shanti Satyal helped in field and laboratory works. The comments and suggestions from editors and anonymous reviewers on the earlier version helped to improve the manuscript.
Funding
Funding for this study is provided by the School of Engineering, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville (SIUE) and Graduate School’s “Research Equipment and Tools” funding program.
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Highlights
• Low-cost, re-usable sensors were developed to measurement salt concentration.
• Sensors were tested in laboratory and field settings.
• Sensors can be used to measure salt concentration in water sources to analyze impacts of human activities on water quality.
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Benjankar, R., Kafle, R. Salt Concentration Measurement Using Re-usable Electric Conductivity–based Sensors. Water Air Soil Pollut 232, 13 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11270-020-04971-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11270-020-04971-7