Assessment of the Quality of Groundwater for its Suitability for Domestic Use in Chalala East, Lusaka

The use of onsite septic tank systems is the most common method carried out by people that live in Lusaka’s forthcoming settlements, in Zambia. Furthermore, water for domestic use is primarily supplied from private boreholes because of the absence of piped water; and lack of municipal sewerage systems in the area is also an issue of concern to this problem.

The Research was experimental in nature and used simple random sampling design in water sample collection. Then water samples were taken to University of Zambia (UNZA) Environmental laboratory for testing. The sample size for the study was 10 water samples but due to limited finance resources only 6 samples were collected. This was based on the consideration of un engineered onsite sewerage systems and unplanned siting of boreholes and septic tanks from one plot to another. A number of households have no idea about groundwater contamination and 95 percent confidence level with 5 percent margin of error. A 50meter Tape measure was used to measure the distance from the borehole to the septic tank, coordinates from where water samples were taken were obtained by GPS locator. A sample size of 6 water samples was drawn from the total households that the researcher used for the purpose of the study which represented the total population. These were sampled randomly. In the study area, 50 percent of boreholes were found to be contaminated with fecal coliforms and total coliforms and 50 percent were found to be contaminated with E coli. Distances between borehole and septic tanks were limited by plot sizes and averaged about 50 percent less than the minimum required distance by WHO. Contamination of groundwater quality calls for rigorous management measures to be put in place by relevant Government authorities to safeguard human health and the environment.