Study of Physicochemical Properties of Soil at Qargha Dam Areas in Paghman District, Kabul, Afghanistan

Abstract

We report our results of the soil research carried out and aimed at the soil around the Qargha areas in the Paghman district, province of Kabul, Afghanistan. For this investigation, we used dissimilar soil samples from the Qargha Dam areas. The samples consist of six different profiles and after extraction, the samples were carefully transported to our research laboratory for analysis. One of the objectives of this study is to identify and profile such areas in terms of their physical and chemical properties and draw any correlation with earlier geological periods of Qargha around Areas. The portions of the dam reservoir are situated at different widths of stratigraphy and hence discharge into dry Rivers during the snow-melting seasons. Normally during years of extra precipitation, the thickness of soil layers varies in size, however, during years of drought the thickness of layers is thin. Since the 1980s, we have not observed noticeable precipitation and snow melting, primarily due to climate change and its impact on Afghanistan. The aquifers, therefore, consist of different sizes of sediments, and in the dam reservoir, we find different sizes of clay, silt and sand, granules. During this investigation, we profiled different formations of stratigraphy consisting of different layers like sand, silty clay, gravel, sand, clayey loam, loam, and silty clay, gravel. Overall, the profiles consist of larger and smaller sizes of sediments, but such profile consists mostly of fine materials, such as clay, silts, and sands. With associated physico-chemical characteristics, such as pH, electro-conductivity, and elemental composition of the soil, this research is, therefore, crucial to study the different profiles, and hydrological patterns in the Paghman district, due to a lack of previously available literature.

Keywords

• Soil
• Physiochemical
• Soil fraction
• Geology
• Loam

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