Project title: Water Detectives.

Team: WB Guardians

IES Wenceslao Benítez   Cádiz   Spain   5 Student’s age: 14-15 years old

Is contamination from the city a risk to local waters?

San Fernando is a town located in the Bahía de Cádiz Natural Park, where you can see different natural ecosystems related to water (marshes, pipes, salt flats and beaches). The water in these ecosystems is affected by human action. The climatic problem that we will investigate is the pollution that the buildings and inhabitants of the city produce, (as we can observe with the restaurants along the coast, shopping centers or even companies dedicated to manufacturing boats) on the local waters. Our town is in the Bay of Cádiz, and the marshes of San Fernando city are a protected area, but with the risk of environmental pollution (plastics, waste, discharges from factories, etc.).For this we have taken samples at three points (clean-point and two possible contaminated points) and analyzed different variables related with water quality: temperature, smell, pH, conductivity, turbidity and dry residue. We used different procedures to get the meassurements.

Temperature: If there is a lot of human intervention, the water temperature is lower.
Smell: The most contaminated place is Bahía Sur.
pH: The higher the contamination, higher the pH (more basic is the water). Water acidification is fundamental in the development of marine ecosystems.
Conductivity: Measured conductivity is inversely to resistance, so the order of electrical conductivity is: Punta del boquerón, Puente de Hierro and Bahía Sur.
Turbidity: It is related to the waste that is dumped into the water. Water from Puente de Hierro is much more crystalline than the other samples.
Dry residue: There is not a great difference between ​​Bahía Sur and Puente del Hierro areas. This indicates similar contamination in both of them. However, contamination by plastics is observed in Puente del Hierro.

The local authorities should be informed of the results obtained.
It would be interesting to include filters in some relevant points in order to take data about the variables stated before on a regular basis. That information could be used to control the variables into acceptable levels.
Last but not least, an awareness campaign could be carried out in areas near the water points, to avoid spills, informing nearby businesses to use detergents and chemical products that are not aggressive to the environment.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cj8rm_0fniEiRX6w9BV8VF7VGpAdj8ip/view?usp=sharing

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