A proposal for groundwater sampling guidelines: application to a case study in southern Latium

Eleonora Frollini (a), David Rossi (a), Martina Rainaldi (a), Daniele Parrone (a), Stefano Ghergo (a) & Elisabetta Preziosi (a)
(a) IRSA-CNR, Via Salaria km 29,300, 00015, Monterotondo (RM), Italy. Corresponding author e-mail: frollini@irsa.cnr.it

The notable differences observed in the analytical results for groundwater samples collected by different operators in several sites in Italy, pointed out the need for a standardized procedure for groundwater sampling at the national level. This “best practice” document, produced by IRSA-CNR and here described, aims to uniform the sampling procedures in order to have comparable results and to manage groundwater monitoring in a more participated and efficient manner. The proposed guideline underlines the relevance of the conceptual model implementation, as well as of the planning and sampling phases. The application of this “best practice” in a case study in southern Latium where dramatic exceedances for Fe, Al, As, Mn in groundwater were reported, demonstrated how sampling procedures could have an important influence on analytical results, mainly the water filtration for inorganic compounds. In the case study, there were no exceedances of the CSC in the filtered samples, except for Mn in SV-PM1 well. Common and standardized sampling procedures should always be applied, in order to have comparable results and avoid legal disputes about the obtained results.

sampling procedure, in-line filtration, monitoring, conceptual model, manganese.