Article AL-QADISIYAH JOURNAL FOR ENGINEERING SCIENCES 12 (2019) 031–037 Contents lists available at http://qu.edu.iq Al-Qadisiyah Journal for Engineering Sciences Journal homepage: http://qu.edu.iq/journaleng/index.php/JQES * Corresponding author:. E-mail address: zainabd.abbas@uokufa.edu.iq (Zainab d Abbasl). https://doi.org/10.30772/qjes.v12i1.586 1998-4456/© 2019 University of Al-Qadisiyah. All rights reserved. Application of GIS and AHP Technologies to Support of Selecting a Suitable Site for Wastewater Sewage Plant in Al Kufa City Zainab dekan Abbasl a* and Osama Jassima aEnvironmental Department, Urban Planning College,Kufa University, Iraq. A R T I C L E I N F O Article history: Received 07 February 2019 Received in revised form 11 March 2019 Accepted 29 March 2019 Keywords: GIS Spatial information system Specifications of Sewage Treatment Modern technologies Analytical hierarchy process A B S T R A C T Sewage water treatment before disposing of it in surface water is one of the most important steps in reducing pollution in these waters, which requires a high-capacity treatment plant for this purpose. Al Kufa city is one of the important cities in Iraq. The city faced a rapid growth of population. This situation creates big environmental complications and hazards. One of the biggest pollution issues in the city is the lack of modern and efficient Waste Water Treatment Plant (WWTP). The aim of this study is to find a suitable site for wastewater plant in Al Kufa city using remote sensing (RS) and Geographical Information System (GIS) modern technologies. There are eight parameters considered in the analysis consists of residential area, sewage areas, roads, a slope of the ground, surface water (river), green areas, historical, and land use. In addition to that, the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) was used to apply the weights for each criterion and sub-criterion, to get the best result and find the ideal site. At the first place, about thirty-eight sites have been identified as suitable sites for wastewater plant throughout the study area which represented through a red region color in a satellite image with its' coordinate table. The best location will be chosen according to the required land area on which the project is to be built from thirty-eight locations. However, a complementary field study is critical to manifest the obtained results T with specialized engineers to find the most effective site for WWTP between these sites. © 2019 University of Al-Qadisiyah. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction The sewage treatment problem is one of the primary issues in many urban communities worldwide and it deteriorated as of late in various districts. In Najaf _ Iraq, Shatt Al Kufa ( Kufa River ) is the major supply of water needed for drinking, irrigation, industry, and other applications. This river shows decreasing quantity and quality of water because of the rapid growth of industrial, agricultural and municipal activities [Khassaf, 2017]. This matter makes this river more susceptible to pollution easily. Therefore sewage water should dilute from its pollution before throwing it in this river, it through an efficient treatment plant. Al-Barrakiya station in Kufa is working on treating heavy water in all the joints of Najaf governorate, which generated very large pressure on that station, which is almost beyond its absorptive capacity figure (1), which necessitates to search for another treatment plant to relieve this pressure. Taking advantage of modern GIS and remote sensing techniques GIS/RS, this study proposes a technique for selecting an optimal site for sewage treatment plant depending on eight criteria. In the recent time, the RS/GIS data and geospatial analysis http://qu.edu.iq/ https://doi.org/10.30772/qjes.v12i 32 ZAINAB D ABBASL and OSAMA JASSIMB /AL-QADISIYAH JOURNAL FOR ENGINEERING SCIENCES 12 (2019) 031–037 fundamentals have been applied to many water and wastewater engineering facilities, particularly in their planning, design, and monitoring before construction and maintenance after construction. The RS/GIS applications give a simple way of integrating and analyzing this environmental data for efficient and successful implementation of an environmental project [Usman, 2013]. Use of GIS programming as a decision-making tool permits for arranging of alternatives which meet the required multiple criteria fully. Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) is a one of Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) has been applied (for the criteria evaluations) to build an evaluation model and has criterion weights [Al Maliki, 2017]. In this paper, we merge the AHP with GIS approaches to support ideal site choice. Numerous environmental studies have shown widespread GIS /RS applications for solving this problem such as [Zaho, 2015] which shows how can choosing an ideal site for a sewage treatment plant in Guangyuan of China in a scientific way by using GIS technic. Another study was [Zaho, 2009] which proved Based on GIS technology, using eco-suitability evaluation method integrating economic, social and ecological factors to optimize the locations of the sewage treatment plants. And [Abdulla and El Khidir, 2017] imploded study which clear how can build a decision-making model for selecting the ideal site for a WWTP utilizing the remote sensing and GIS data and analysis coupled with the multi Criteria Analysis (MCA) for six criteria in Omdurman city Sudan. . Figure 1. A sewage treatment plant in Al Kufa city [6] 2. Study Area In this search (Al Kufa city) is the Study area, as the biggest city in the Najaf Governorate it is a city in Iraq, it lies about 170 kilometers south of Baghdad, and 10 kilometers northeast of Najaf. It is located on the banks of the Euphrates River. The estimated population in 2016 was (31.129.225), Geographical coordinates, it located in degrees minutes seconds (WGS84) Latitude( 32◦02'05''), Longitude (44◦ 24' 12''). The total area is 438.317 km2, approximately. [www.http//alkufa,2018] figure (2, 3). The main hydrological features are the perennial Al Kufa river represents the main source of agriculture and drinking water. Figure 2. Located off the study area [5] Figure 3. A boundary of the study area [5] 3. Materials and Methods Different information sources have been used during this study, they can be classified into two main sorts as raster and vector information sources, the following data are employed in this study. Original Data, the obtained map data represent different aspects, of the residential area, sewage, roads, slope of the ground, surface water, green areas, historical, and land use maps. The methodology adopted in this study is principally supported using the geospatial analysis and Multi-Criteria Analysis (MCA) among the framework of GIS [Abdalla,207]. Depends on the importance of location in the arrange. Finally, the result was introduced by the MCA model. Various factors have been thought of so as to find appropriate areas for wastewater treatment plant The factors described criteria and parameters of the selection of the optimum site. A number of 3 teams of criteria, including the environmental, geological and economic criteria and a total of eight parameters (as above), for selecting an acceptable place for construction of WWTP. 4. Criteria for Site Selection Wastewater plant siting needs to consider many factors, and site selection refers to the process of selecting a suitable location for the facilities. The criteria according to the most world sources can be inserted as below:-  Distance from residential areas.  Proximity to main and regional roads.  Proximity to agricultural land (green areas).  Proximity to drainage network (sewage system).  Distance from historical areas.  Distance from the river.  The location should be in a few slope areas.  Some conditions for the station's location for land use. 5. GIS Criteria Description and Analysis The procedure of Multi-Criteria Analysis "MCA" for site choice of Waste Water Treatment Plant (WWTP) involves AN integration and analysis of varied information. This kind of research was performed among the geospatial analysis of GIS framework besides the Analytical Hierarchy Processes (AHP). 6. Results and Discussions Based on their importance, the main criteria are ones that have a right away influence on the chosen website. They consist of eight elements: the residential area, sewage system, roads, slope of the ground, surface water (Al Kufa River), green areas, historical, and land use. Each criterion was ZAINAB D ABBASL and OSAMA JASSIMB /AL-QADISIYAH JOURNAL FOR ENGINEERING SCIENCES 12 (2019) 031–037 33 divided into two classes: appropriate and inappropriate. The results are shown in four stages as insert below :- 6.1. First Stage (Input Data) It contains the original maps related to the search as shown in figures (4- 11). Figure 4. Land use map of the study area [4] Figure 5. Main roads map of the study area [made by Researchers based on 4] Figure 6. Residential map of the study area [made by researchers based on 4] Figure 7. Green areas map of the study area[3] Figure 8. Kufa river map of the study area [ made by researchers based on 7]. Figure 9. Historic map of the study area [7] Figure 10. Sewage map of the study area[3] Figure 11. Slope of the ground map of the study area[7] 34 ZAINAB D ABBASL and OSAMA JASSIMB /AL-QADISIYAH JOURNAL FOR ENGINEERING SCIENCES 12 (2019) 031–037 6.2. Second Stage (Derive Dataset) It means to convert all features to raster for all layers as shown in figures (12-19). [all maps in this section made by researchers through GIS program]. Figure 12. Land use raster Figure 13. Main roads raster Figure 14. Residential areas raster Figure 15. Green areas raster 6.3. Third Stage (Reclassify Datasets) Reclassification of layers be within a common scale of 1-15, the higher values in the measure must be most appropriate. [all maps in this section made by researchers through GIS program]. Figure 16. Slope areas raster Figure 17. Kufa river raster Figure 18. Historical areas raster Figure 19. Sewage pipes raster ZAINAB D ABBASL and OSAMA JASSIMB /AL-QADISIYAH JOURNAL FOR ENGINEERING SCIENCES 12 (2019) 031–037 35 6.3.1. Reclassification Distance From Land The land is used for various functions like agricultural, industrial, and residential. as these areas are the most vulnerable lands, they were marked as the unsuitable class. Whereas the industrial and commercial lands thought-about as less vulnerable land. Other area units as such as blank lands are considered appropriate as no activities on them. The land use map of the study area shows the varied sorts of land use Figure (20). Figure 20. Land use reclassify map 6.3.2. Reclassification Distance From Main Roads The location of the station should preferably be close to the main roads, so the areas near will take the highest scale of 15, which is the most appropriate, while the remote areas are the least appropriate number1 as shown in figure (21) Figure 21. Main roads reclassify map 6.3.3. Reclassification Distance From the Residential Due to inappropriate environmental conditions and creating unpleasant odors, wastewater treatment plant should be placed far from residential areas. Therefore, number 15 is given to the region that farthest to the residential, which are appropriate and the number 1 for the closest which are defined as, not appropriate as shown in figure (22) Figure 22. Residential reclassify map 6.3.4. Reclassification Distance From the Green Areas Distance from the vegetation like a forest is necessary to safeguard the worth of the lands. The station should preferably be far from the green areas Therefore, number 15 is given to the region that farthest to the green areas, which are appropriate and the number 1 for the closest as shown in figure (23). Figure 23. Green areas reclassify map 6.3.5. Reclassification Distance from the Surface Water Areas Distance from the surface water is necessary to safeguard the water and fish from pollution because of the domestic use of the water in the city as drinking and farming water from the surface water. The Al Kufa River represent the making source of this surface water, The location of the station should preferably be away from the river so the areas farthest from the river will take the highest scale of 15, which is the most suitable while the nearby areas are the number 1 which is the least suitable as shown in figure (24) Figure 24. River reclassify map 6.3.6. Reclassification Distance from the Historical Areas The station should preferably be far from the historical regions Therefore, number 15 is given to the region that farthest to the historical regions, which are appropriate and the number 1 for the closest which are defined as, not appropriate as shown in figure (25) Figure 25. Historic roads reclassify map 36 ZAINAB D ABBASL and OSAMA JASSIMB /AL-QADISIYAH JOURNAL FOR ENGINEERING SCIENCES 12 (2019) 031–037 6.3.7. Reclassification Distance from the Sewage Areas The station should preferably be close to the sewage net, Therefore, number 15 is given to the region that closest to the sewage, which are appropriate and the number 1 for the farthest which are defined as, not appropriate as shown in figure (26). 6.3.8. Reclassification Distance from the Slope of the Ground In site choice studies, the slope is a necessary element both environmentally and economically the station should preferably be on a low slope. Therefore, slope layer will be reclassified and the number 15 is given to the slopes with the lowest angles, which are appropriate and the number 1 for the lowest slopes which are, not appropriate as shown in figure (27). 6.3.9. Fourth Stage (Weight and Combine ) At this stage, the layers will be weighed according to the effect ratios of each layer in the project, and then the balanced classes will be summed with each other. The output of this process is the map of the fit (Map of relevance) as shown in figure (28). [Map made by researchers through GIS program and table 1]. 6.3.10. Fifth Stage (Project Drop on the Ground) The boundaries of the appropriate areas with values 15 or close are converted to coordinates(Red Areas) by reclassifying the relevance map, and then transfer it to vector as shown in figure (29,30) and table (2) [ maps and table made by researchers through GIS program]. Table 1. Weight and combine [researchers based on criteria influence]. Ratio% Layers No. 1 Sewage 23 2 Residential Areas 17 3 Euphrates River 15 4 Main Roads 11 5 Historic Regions 10 6 Green Regions 9 7 Land Uses 8 8 Slopes 7 Sum 100 Table 2. Coordinate of relevance region as found in arc map(10.5) Figure 26. Sewage pipes reclassify map Figure 27. Slope of the ground reclassify map Figure 28. Relevance map Figure 29. Relevance map reclassify Figure 30. Relevance raster to vector map ZAINAB D ABBASL and OSAMA JASSIMB /AL-QADISIYAH JOURNAL FOR ENGINEERING SCIENCES 12 (2019) 031–037 37 7. Conclusions ArcGIS geoprocessing is an important component of ArcGIS and includes many processes that can be used to extract information from presented data. The study mentioned the importance of modern technologies for using it to solve environmental problems the Waste Water Treatment Plant (WWTP) within the progress of environmental protection. The methodology adopted within the study combined the techniques of the remote sensing and GIS to create the study easier and to urge valuable info regarding the study space. Moreover, It offers additional correct results compared to standard ways. Hence, GIS has verified to be a robust tool in managing special and non- spatial information in suitableness analysis. Integration of GIS and AHP provides best call tool in choosing acceptable WWTP in the acceptable website. Eight criteria were selected, that is residential, sewage, roads, the slope of the ground, surface water, green areas, historical, and land use. A paired comparison matrix was ready for criteria. The weights were applied in linear summation equation to get a unified weight map containing due weights of all input variable. Finally, all weighted maps were reclassified to urge the most effective potential website location of WWTP. The results disclosed that many of separated sites (as shown above with red color) will function sites for the WWTP. These sites wide are distributed within the north, south and west Al Kufa localities. The best location will be chosen according to the required land area on which the project is to be built from thirty-eight locations However, a complementary field study is critical to manifest the obtained results. during this respect, it's extremely recommendations to conduct any field survey of the chosen areas with the presence of specialized engineers to find the most effective location for WWTP between these sites and with every zone. Moreover, such studies require the use of high- special resolution remotely perceived information and GIS Geodatabase layers to get a lot of elaborated and good results. The adopted methodology is often applied to get optimum sites choice in similar analysis covering studies. References [1] A. Al Maliki, Application of GIS and AHP method to support of selecting a suitable site for lead pollution: a case study, Misan Journal for Academic Sciences 31 (2017) 57-69. [2] O. Abdalla, S. 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