Fuentes de contaminación estacionales en la cuenca del río Utcubamba, región Amazonas, Perú

Abstract

There is an increasing need to assess the quality of water to protect public health. The research was conducted on the Utcubamba River, a tributary of the Alto Marañón basin, located entirely in the region of Amazonas, Peru. A total of 43 sampling stations were established throughout the river basin, which were evaluated in two seasons: rainy and dry. Nineteen physicochemical and microbiological parameters were evaluated, whose results were used to determine the possible sources of contamination of the system. Agricultural and domestic waste, the presence of illegal landfills and quarries and the absence of riparian forests are the main activities and factors that affect water quality. Likewise, variables such as CE, DUR, T, TB, CF, CLO, CT, EC and EF showed significant differences between sections of basin, while CE, OD, TB, CT and EC showed differences between seasons of sampling. Finally, significant correlations were established between the microbiological parameters, which indicated the organic origin of the contamination; between physicochemical parameters such as TB, CE, NITRA and FOSFA that showed the agricultural origin of the effluents, and between DUR and ALCA, as a result of the contamination from a natural geological origin in the study area.