• Journal of Soil and Groundwater Environment
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.57-67
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• 2003

Nitrate contamination by human activities is a serious problem to water-supply in agricultural area. Shallow groundwater is the main source of water-supply, but it is very sensitive to contamination. Study area for nitrate contamination is a region of Iljuk, Kyunggi where is an agricultural area having many livestock facilities in various scales. As a result, the points having availability of incoming of external contaminant are 77%, and the ones over the Drinking Water Limit (DWL) are 32～42%. For a nitrogen isotope analysis, all the points having availability of incoming of external contaminant have $\delta$$^{15}$ N-NO$_3$ values over 5$\textperthousand$, and the points of 59% are strongly affected by nitrogen originated from animal wastes. The major source of nitrate in this area is intensive livestock facilities. Even though a livestock facility had enclosed, it affects groundwater quality for a long time. The chemical property of contaminant source is various according to animal species in surface water, but not in groundwater since some solutes are removed by reactions during an inflow to subsurface.