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A STUDY ON TEMPORAL AND SPATIAL VARIATION OF

GROUNDWATER LEVEL IN SYLHET DIVISION

Abstract
As groundwater is one of the major water sources in Bangladesh, groundwater and groundwater
management play a key role in conserving sustainable environmental conditions. The popularity
of using software based data management tools to justify existing vulnerabilities and overall status
of groundwater level in Bangladesh which has direct impact on water demand has been observed
in recent years while few studies of groundwater level trend analysis of Bangladesh has been found
in literature, temporal and spatial variation of groundwater level of Sylhet division is yet to be
studied. It was therefore aimed in this current study to determine the status of groundwater level
throughout the years 1980, 1985, 1990, 1995, 2000-2010 in the for districts of Sylhet division
namely Sunamganj, Habiganj, Moulvibazar and Sylhet Sadar. Spatial and temporal analysis of
groundwater level fluctuation of 62 wells out of 101 wells which has less than 25% missing values
was performed to determine the groundwater level status. For temporal analysis, homogeneity was
checked using Standard Normal Homogeneity Test and Pettit Test. The trend of the groundwater
level was analyzed using Mann-Kendall Test where non-parametric Sens Slope Estimator was
used to calculate the magnitude of the trends. Based on the magnitude of the trend a risk map was
created. For spatial analysis, Ordinary kriging and Empirical Bayesian Kriging (EBK) was used
with cross validation to choose the best model. This study shows that the water level of the study
area is degrading day by day especially the northern parts of Sylhet division shows more drastic
degradation rate as compared to the other parts. Jamalganj, Tahirpur and Dharmapasha upazilas of
Sunamganj district are found to have critically low groundwater level. This region immediate
sustainable management to ensure that the resource can continue to meet the quantitative demands
being placed upon it.

Keyword: Groundwater Level, Temporal Variation, Spatial Variation, Pettit Test, Mann-Kendall
Test, Kriging, Senss Slope.

Zubayet Hossain
Reg. No.: 2010333043
&
Md. Imnur Rahman
Reg. No.: 2010333058
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Supervisor
Dr. Muhammad Azizul Hoque
Professor
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Shahjalal University of Science and Technology
Sylhet 3114, Bangladesh