Geochemical and Climatic Influences on Spatiotemporal Water Quality Changes in Drinking Water Source Lakes in Pakistan

This study investigates the spatiotemporal changes in water features and quality of three key drinking water source lakes-Rawal, Simly, and Khanpur (RSK), using Level 2 Landsat 5, 7 and 8 satellite data from 1991 to 2020, changes in lake surface area were assessed through the Google Earth Engine (GEE) platform with the codes. Data used from satellite LT <= 1998 → LT05, 1999–2012 → LE07, and 2013+ → LC08. Thresholding and geospatial analysis in ArcGIS 10.8 were used to extract and visualize water bodies and surface feature changes. For water seasonal water quality, bacterial counts were analyzed by using membrane filtration technique during the dry and wet season and through standard methods of Microbiology (APHA, 2005). Among the heavy metals were analyzed (Fe, F, As, Cu, Zn, Mn, Cr, Pb, Ni, B, Cd, P, Hg), Standard Method,3114 B (AAS Hydride Generation Mode) was used for As and Standard Method, 3111 for other metals through Atomic Absorption of Spectroscopy (AAS) as mentioned in APHA (2023).