Journal of Geoscience and Environment Protection
Vol.03 No.09(2015), Article ID:61575,8 pages
10.4236/gep.2015.39007 Hydro-Chemistry of Gokyo Valley, Sagarmatha (Everest) National Park, NepalRajendra Bhandari1*, Subodh Sharma1, Juerg Merz2, Robin Garton2
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1Department of Environmental Science and Engineering, Kathmandu University, Dhulikhel, Nepal2The Glacier Trust, Wiltshire, UKCopyright © 2015 by authors and Scientific Research Publishing Inc.This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution International License (CC BY).http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Received 1 September 2015; accepted 27 November 2015; published 30 November 2015ABSTRACTThis research work records the baseline inventory of selected ions in running waters of Gokyo Valley, Nepal and tries to establish relationship of these ions’ concentration with elevation gradient. Among these selected hydro-chemical parameters, the average concentration of Ca2+, Mg2+, and total silica were determined to be 3.25 (±2.02), 0.64 (±0.47), 207.2 (±423.01) and 0.36 (±0.17) mg/L respectively. Concentration of these parameters was low compared to earlier studies except that could be justified too since the sampling was performed only once in drier period with low atmospheric input of acid protons required for weathering process. Moreover, Pearson Product-moment Correlation Coefficients (r) for elevation gradient and concentration of Ca2+, Mg2+, and total silica were determined to be +0.350, +0.145, +0.101 and −0.275 respectively. Such weak relationship between these parameters and elevation gradient suggests that the concentration of these ions is related to weathering phenomena, glacier and watershed characteristics and snow cover dynamics in Gokyo Valley.