Geographic information system and remote sensing for groundwater potential zone mapping in Dire Dawa, Ethiopia

ABSTRACT Conventional groundwater exploration gives higher-quality results, but it is time-consuming and expensive. In recent years, geographic information system-based studies have gained much importance in groundwater exploration. This study aimed to delineate the groundwater potential zone of Dire-Dawa using controlling and indicating features. Thematic layers were prepared with the help of remote sensing (RS), geographic information systems (GIS), and analytical hieratical process (AHP) techniques to assess the groundwater potential zone weight overlay analysis and the AHP used. The weight for each thematic map was assigned and accordingly, geomorphology, geology, and slope thematic layers were assigned higher weight whereas soil and land use/land cover thematic layers were assigned lower weight for groundwater potential zone identification. Finally, the weighted thematic maps were integrated by weighted overlay to generate groundwater potential zones. Thus five groundwater potential zones were demarcated as very high (0.035%), high (27.75%), moderate (62.04%), poor (10.14%), and very poor (0.035%) of the total area. The accuracy of the output was cross-validated with boreholes drilled in the study area and showed 73%. Therefore the result demonstrates that RS and GIS techniques are potentially important tools in the delineation of groundwater potential zones of the area at low costs and time.