Carpathian Journal of Earth and Environmental Sciences

This paper characterizes the present-day quality of groundwater from the Glavacioc catchment and tests the existence of significant differences between the chemical components of the groundwater and surface water. Water samples were collected from wells located in the built-up area of villages and from the surface water of the Glavacioc River. There was a large spatial variability among the chemical components from both groundwater and surface water. The means of some pollutants (N-NO₃) exceeded the permissible values established by the law; however, other ions like SO₄^-2, Cl^-, Na⁺ and electrical conductivity also exceeded the limits as individual values, but only in some wells. The existence of some harmful anions to human health, like N-NO3, from the wells situated within the built-up area of villages does not necessarily demonstrate their leaching from the arable land toward the groundwater, but rather deficiencies of hydrological isolation of the nitrate sources from human households.