RESEARCH ARTICLE Identification of Artificial Recharge Sites for Noyyal River Basin Using GIS and Remote Sensing A. Geetha Selvarani 1 & G. Maheswaran 2 & K. Elangovan 3 Received: 7 February 2014 /Accepted: 20 December 2015 # Indian Society of Remote Sensing 2016 Abstract The water is a nature’ s valuable gift to all life forms. Water quality and quantity plays a major role for the growth and development of community. Both natural and human fac- tors influence the quality and quantity of water source. Depending upon the quality and quantity of groundwater it can be used for various purposes, such as drinking, agricultur- al and industrial. Due to revolution in industries and various anthropogenic sources in the past decades, groundwater has been polluted and depleted. Remote sensing and Geographical Information System (GIS) has become one of the leading tools in the field of hydrogeological science, which helps in assessing, monitoring and conserving groundwater resources. GIS technology provides suitable alternatives for efficient management of large and complex databases. In recent years, the increasing use of satellite remote sensing data has made it easier to define the spatial distribution of different groundwa- ter prospect classes on the basis of geomorphology and other associated parameters. Analysis of remotely sensed data along with Survey of India(SOI) topographical sheets and collateral information with necessary field checks helps in generating the base line information for artificial recharge. The artificial recharge sites were identified by integrating thematic maps of geology, geomorphology, slope, drainage density and linea- ment density of the study area. The study focuses on the de- velopment of remote sensing and GIS based analysis and methodology for identifying artificial recharge studies in Noyyal river basin. Keywords Noyyal river . Weighted overlay analyses . GIS . Groundwater . Artificial recharge sites . Lineament density . Drainage density . Geology . Geomorphology . Land use/ landcover Introduction Water, one of the most essential materials in our day-to-day life is becoming scarce in rural as well as in urban areas mainly due to reduction in infiltration rate as a result of deforestation in rural areas and large scale paving of the surface in urban areas. In India, though a huge quantity of surface water is available, the topography and other factors limit the storage of this water (Elango and Mohan 1997). Where the surface water is scarce, the alternative source is groundwater assumes importance in the context of water supply. Due to over-exploitation of groundwater, the groundwater levels in many areas show a declining trend, which in turn tends to increase both the investment cost and the operational cost (Jothiprakash et al. 2003). This problem could be sorted out to certain extent by artificially recharging the potential aquifers. Artificial groundwater recharge is becoming increasingly necessary as growing population require more water and as more stores is needed * A. Geetha Selvarani geethacivil1201@gmail.com G. Maheswaran maheswaran_rgs@yahoo.co.in K. Elangovan elangovan2k@rediffmail.com 1 Department of Civil Engineering, K.S.R. College of Engineering, Tiruchencode, 637 215 Namakkal District, Tamil Nadu, India 2 VSA School of Management, NH-47, Main Road, Uthamasolapuram, Salem 636010, Tamil Nadu, India 3 Department of Civil Engineering, PSG College of Technology, Coimbatore 641 004, Tamil Nadu, India J Indian Soc Remote Sens DOI 10.1007/s12524-015-0542-5