Suitability for developing riverside groundwater sources along Songhua River, Northeast China

Riverbank filtration is a natural water treatment technology that consists of extracting water from rivers by pumping wells located in the adjacent alluvial aquifer. It is vital to choose the most appropriate from multiple potential candidate sites, which is a complex procedure and seldom paid attention to. In this study, a method system including multicriteria evaluation indexes was developed with which the suitability of bank filtration along the Songhua River of China for developing riverside groundwater sources was assessed. The system was comprised of main suitability indexes for water quantity, water quality, interaction intensity between surface water and groundwater, and the exploitation condition of aquifer condition, weights of which were determined by specialist marking methods. Based on this assessment system, the suitability of the study area was divided into five grades. Results show that riversides along Lalin River, Hulan River, and the middle part of Songhua River are suitable for developing riverside groundwater sources.