A study on water environmental protection and sustainable utilization of Bosten Lake, Xinjiang

Located in north western China, the Bosten Lake is the largest continental fresh water lake in China, and the water environmental problems of the lake are very serious. Based on field investigations and monitoring data during 1999 2001, the water environmental problems and its causes in the Bosten Lake have been discussed by analyzing the characteristics of pollutants, changes of water quality, distributions of dumping pollutant sources and dumping pollutant quantity. The results show that: with the descent of water level and the shrinkage of water area of the lake from 1048.75 and 1005 km 2 in the 1960s to 1045.21 and 900 km 2 in the 1980s respectively, the mineralization increases as high as 2.74 times; there are about 26 pollutant drainage canals in the Bosten Lake area with an annual discharge of over 2.74×10 8 m 3 of pollutant water into the lake;the main pollution source to water quality of the Boston Lake is Huangshui general trunk canal drainage alongside some other trunk canal drainages; the third quarter is the highest season in water pollution and the amount of chloride ion, sulfate radical and mineralization entering the Bosten Lake is 2 to 4 times that of discharging from the lake; the amount of industrial sewage drainaging in the lake is about 500×10 4 m 3 , an increase of 70% compared with the 1960s; the main pollutants of industrial sewage are COD, BOD 5 and SS, and the amount of drainage is 11214 t, 7029 t and 2431 t respectively. The water body pollutants mainly contain the chloride ion, the sulfate radical, the mineralization, COD and the ammonia nitrogen and so on. The countermeasures for water environmental protection and sustainable utilization of the Boston Lake were proposed in the paper. Firstly, the pollution control in the basin should be done by establishing nature protection area of the Bosten Lake, hancing management and law enforcement, strengthening management of pollutant discharge to the lake and strictly control industrial sewage to enter the lake. And secondly, some ecological engineering measures for water resources protection in the basin should be taken through rehabilitating of lake shore and wetland, increasing the source and saving irrigation water and speeding up water cycle of the Bosten Lake.