ABSTRACT

Urbanization and population growth have resulted in the increase of construction of housing and drilling boreholes around cemeteries causing potential public health and environmental concerns. Although cemeteries provide ecosystem services including green space, micrometeorology control and storm water infiltration, they pose a unique threat to the quality of groundwater as pollutants migrate from graves to aquifers. This paper investigated the analysis of groundwater contamination in Third Cemetery in Benin Metropolis, South-South of Nigeria, using Electrical Resistivity and Physicochemical analysis of water. The implications of land utilization for burial of dead human bodies in the form of cemeteries, many cases associated with coffin and caskets used for interment of remains and the location of refuse dump have received no consideration in Nigeria. Interment of bodies in cemeteries remain widespread practice and the only alternative endpoint to dead bodies in Nigeria. In Nigeria, this practice had not been perceived as having a significant potential contaminant effect in the environment and especially the groundwater component as search of literature attracted no such study to the country. In Benin City and Nigeria in general, the major cemeteries are located close to human residential areas and virtually all the populace within this locality depends on groundwater as the primary water source for various domestic purposes. The investigation of cemeteries is always difficult and challenging task in geoforensic prospective. Most researchers assess the impact of interment on the environment by comparing study results from cemeteries with data from reference sites. This study is based on this premise. The 2-D Geological Models showed that Third Cemetery contained leachate plumes of various degrees as indicated by the low resistivity values, which infiltrated into the groundwater. The average value of Water Quality Index (WQI) of groundwater samples obtained in Third Cemetery was calculated which indicated that the quality of water at Third Cemetery is good for drinking and other domestic purposes though with some degrees of contamination.