Water Quality Assessment of the Choghakhor Wetland for Heavy Metals Using MI, HPI, HEI, Cd and IRWQIST Indices

In order to maintain the ecological and biological sustainability of wetlands, it is necessary to have a proper understanding of their physical, biological and chemical environment and to investigate the status of heavy metals in them. The purpose of this study was to investigate the contamination of Choghakhor wetland with arsenic, copper, chromium, lead, zinc and cadmium using MI, HPI, HEI, Cd and IRWQIST indices during autumn 2018. Surface water sampling was performed in 10 stations and the concentration of metals was measured by ICP-MASS. The results of calculation of water pollution indices also showed that the wetland water was within the danger threshold class in terms of drinking according to MI index in all of the stations with a value of 1.04 and within the low pollution class according to HEI index with a value of 0.46. Cd index showed low pollution with a value of -4.96 and HPI showed that wetland water was not polluted with heavy metals with a value of 34.73. Also, according to the results of IRWQIST index, water quality was within the good condition of this index in all studied stations in terms of toxic pollutants with the lowest value of 76.4 in station 1 and the highest value of 80.4 in station 10. Therefore, the water quality of Choghakhor wetland was within the low pollution condition in terms of heavy metals in the water, which requires special attention to the water quality of this wetland in order to prevent further pollution.