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Introduction
Felix Mtalo currently works at the Department of Water Resources Engineering, University of Dar es Salaam. Felix does research in Environmental Chemistry, Chemical Kinetics and Civil Engineering. Their current project is 'Development of Affordable Adsorbents systems for Arsenic and Fluoride removal in drinking water sources in Tanzania (DAFWAT). 2015-2020 '.
Skills and Expertise
Additional affiliations
February 1998 - January 2002
Publications
Publications (93)
In this article, we examine the scientific and sustainable research capacity outcomes of the ‘Congo River: user Hydraulics and Morphology’ or CRuHM project, a six-year effort supported by the Royal Society’s Africa Capacity Building Initiative. This project brought together a consortium of African and UK universities to undertake the first large-sc...
For decades, researchers in many disciplines have neglected the spatial aspects of data collected on geographical phenomena of interest during the analysis stage. This has been due to lack of computational capabilities and limitation in conventional methods. Consequently, insight gained in the data is not optimal. In this study, we present a novel...
Geogenic contamination of drinking water sources in the gold mining areas of Lake Victoria Basin in Tanzania is an emerging health risk of concern. Elevated concentrations of trace elements such as arsenic and mercury, has been associated with the mining activities which impaired the access to safe water for diverse human uses. In this study, we in...
Geogenic contamination of surface and groundwater is frequently associated in regions of gold mining worldwide and related to drinking water quality problems. In Tanzania, elevated levels of trace elements (TEs) have been reported in drinking water sources within the Lake Victoria Basin, posing a serious health risk to communities. The present stud...
Animal bone char has long been used as an adsorbent for removing fluoride from drinking water. It is particularly popular in developing countries owing to the readily available raw materials, simple manufacturing process, low cost, and ease of use on a household scale. Widespread production of bone char has been implemented, but the resultant impac...
Geogenic contamination of surface and groundwater is frequently associated in regions of gold mining worldwide and related to drinking water quality problems. In Tanzania, elevated levels of trace elements (TEs) have been reported in drinking water sources within the Lake Victoria Basin, posing a serious health risk to communities. The present stud...
In the past two decades, a number of studies on arsenic (As) occurrence in the environment, particularly in surface and groundwater systems have reported high levels of As in several countries of the African continent. Arsenic concentrations up to 10000 μg/L have been reported in surface water systems, caused by human activities such as mining, ind...
Avec les récents développements des technologies pour étudier le transport des sédiments dans les plans d'eau, comme la télédétection et les améliorations des modèles de prédiction de l'érosion, les mesures de concentration des sédiments sur le terrain sont toujours nécessaires pour calibrer et valider les résultats de ces études. Les détails de l'...
The Congo River provides a huge potential for socio‐economic growth at the regional scale, but with limited information on the river dynamics it is difficult for basin countries to benefit from this potential, and to invest in the development of water resources. Accurate information is needed to support adequate management strategies such as predic...
The Congo River is navigable along much of its length and plays a crucial role in the economies of nine basin countries. River users rely on river transport for access to markets, resources, and key services. These users range from millions of small‐scale informal users, to industrial‐scale users such as mining and logging companies. Without a func...
Le fleuve Congo offre un potentiel important pour la croissance économique à l’échelle régionale, mais avec des informations limitées sur la dynamique des cours d'eau, il est difficile pour les pays riverains de tirer profit de ce potentiel et d'investir dans le développement des ressources en eau. Des informations précises sont nécessaires pour so...
Le fleuve Congo est navigable sur une grande partie de sa longueur et il joue un rôle crucial dans les économies de neuf pays du bassin. Les usagers du fleuve dépendent du transport fluvial pour accéder aux marchés, aux ressources et aux services essentiels. Ces utilisateurs vont des millions de petits utilisateurs informels aux utilisateurs indust...
Groundwater contamination from geogenic sources poses challenges to many countries, especially in the developing world. In Tanzania, the elevated fluoride (F⁻) concentration and related chronic fluorosis associated with drinking F⁻ rich water are common in the East African Rift Valley regions. In these regions, F⁻ concentration is space dependence...
Over the years, groundwater has been used as a means of adaptation to the seasonal and perennial scarcity of surface water. Groundwater provides water for households, livestock, and irrigation in semi-arid areas of Tanzania. It is acknowledged that groundwater is susceptible to chemical and other mineral contamination which not only poses a threat...
Spatial uncertainty caused by large-scale variation in fluoride (F⁻) occurrence remains a setback for water supply authorities in the F⁻ belts of the world. It is estimated that approximately 80 million people in the East African Rift Valley (EARV) regions and volcanic areas exhibit a wide variety of fluorosis symptoms due to drinking water with F¯...
Currently, in Tanzania, fluoride removal from drinking water is treated mostly using the bone char method. The method has poor acceptability in some religious communities and also causes water quality deterioration in taste and odour if the bones are not properly prepared. The use of local natural adsorbents as an alternative is feasible with limit...
With recent developments in technologies to study sediment transport in water bodies, such as remote sensing and improvements in erosion prediction models, field‐derived sediment concentration measurements are still required to calibrate and validate the results of such studies. The details of the establishment of a high‐frequency sediment sampling...
Safe drinking water supply systems in naturally contaminated hydrogeological environments require precise geoinformation on contamination hotspots. Spatial statistical methods and GIS were used to study fluoride occurrence in groundwater and identify significant spatial patterns using fluoride concentrations. The global and local Moran's I indices...
Studies undertaken in data scarce and ungauged watersheds from DR Congo, Malawi and studies by WaterNet graduates students over the past five years provide a sound basis and increased scientific of methods for assessment of potential and actual soil erosion especially in the absence of ground data. The studies were conducted in the N’djili and N’se...
p>The surface of ferrihydrite adsorbs arsenic (As) effectively. In this investigation, the As laced water samples collected from Geita and Mara regions within the Lake Victoria Basin (LVB) under DAFWAT project were simulated onVisual MINTEQ 3.1 software to determine the amount of ferrihydrite required to adsorb a given amount of As from water. Mode...
This study uses the Global Assessment of Soil Degradation (GLASOD) to map sediment sources and erosion process types within the Congo Basin as part of a scoping study to guide a basin wide sedimentation study. The GLASOD map is validated using information from literature and published sediment concentration data at the Brazzaville gauging station,...
Occurrence of elevated concentrations of fluoride in the drinking water supply in many regions of the world has caused widespread dental and skeletal fluorosis. In this paper the studies available on the routes of fluoride exposure, regions with excess fluoride in water sources and various defluoridation techniques has been reviewed. It is evident...
Deficit irrigation combined with appropriate type of fertilizer is commonly considered as the best
management practice for irrigated agriculture. The objective of this work is to study the influence of
applying deficit irrigation and natural stimulant materials fertilization under greenhouse condition on
yield and quality of cucumber and soil chem...
Surface and ground water are the major sources of water supply in Meru district. Most of the people in Meru rural areas depend on surface water in rivers and ground water shallow and deep wells and springs for house hold activities. The presence of fluoride in high concentrations in drinking water or cooking water causes severe health problems to t...
Rainfall Runoff modeling is an important tool in the study of water resources and water management of the watersheds. Rainfall runoff models are mainly used for river flow forecasting for the management of the resource and to minimize the ill effects through early warning measures. This paper deals with rainfall runoff modeling of the upper Awash R...
The Sustainable Development Goals concept advocates affordable, safe and clean water supply. The water shortage in Dar es Salaam city affects communities in different wards of Kinondoni municipality. As a strategy to improve water access, this study assessed opportunities for application of rainwater harvesting (RWH) technologies, communities’ know...
Sediment transport in rivers is associated with a huge environmental and engineering issues such as navigation problems, silting of fish spawning beds and habitat disturbance, hydropower plants problems. N’sele river is known to carry heavy sediment load into the Malebo Pool due to the extensive erosion in the basin. The empirical approach known as...
Different bone char (BC) preparation methods affect the physical chemical properties and therefore the capacity to remove fluoride. Fluoride removal capacities of BC prepared at three controlled temperatures, with particle grain sizes of 250-500 μm, 500-1,000 μm and 1,000-1,800 μm were determined in column experiments with an initial fluoride conce...
Climatological influences and catchment pressures have altered the natural energy regime in the lower Mara River in Tanzania, creating conditions favourable for sedimentation. Wetland growth in the lower Mara River is investigated through particle size analyses and high resolution micro-XRF screening of sediment cores from the area. Geochemical pro...
Groundwater resources are becoming the major source of portable water for domestic, industrial and irrigation use in many parts of the globe. However, targeting safer aquifer remains uncertain among drillers and local users. In Tanzania, a part from efforts made by the government to bring close clean water to her citizens, 40% of these drinking wat...
Vegetation resistance influences water flow in floodplains. Characterization of vegetation for hydraulic modeling includes the description of the spatial variability of vegetation type, height and density. In this research, we explored the use of dual polarized Radarsat-2 wide swath mode backscatter coefficients (σ°) and Landsat 5 TM to derive spat...
SPECIAL EDITION Valuing the Arc (VTA) was a research programme that ran from 2007 to 2012 and mapped, modelled and valued ecosystem services within and flowing from the Eastern Arc Mountains, with the objective of informing decisions for sustainable management of the remaining natural habitats. The services we focused on were carbon, water, nature-...
Increase in population has resulted in pressure for more land and water use for food security in Northeast Tanzania. This calls for proper understanding of spatial-temporal variations of quality and quantity of water to ensure sustainable management. The number of hydro-meteorological stations such as rainfall stations and flow measuring stations h...
Water defluoridation in a fixed bed column may be optimized through choice of flow rate. This, however, affects breakthrough characteristics. In any fixed bed system an understanding of flow rate and breakthrough interactions is therefore important to guide choice of design velocity. Consequently interactions between flow rate and break through cha...
Breakthrough characteristics, kinetics, and dose-effect in defluoridation with bauxite, gypsum, magnesite, and their composites were determined. The aim was to identify optimum filter and configuration viable for groundwater defluoridation. Bed depth service time (BDST) design model and empty bed residence time (EBRT) optimization model were employ...
Research on water defluoridation with composite filters of bauxite, gypsum and
magnesite was carried out at Ngurdoto Research Station to determine capacity,
nature of fluoride-sorbent interaction and changes in water quality. The objective
was to identify an optimum composite filter that would not alter the water quality
beyond World Health Organis...
This paper focuses on developing methods for both potential and actual evapotranspiration (ET) models for the data scarce conditions of the Eastern Arc Mountains catchment of Tanzania. For reliable estimation of the components of the hydrological cycle and plant water uptake, potential ET estimates are required, and for catchment water balance actu...
Hydrologic models are increasingly used to support decisions at various levels and guide water resources policy formulation, management and regulations. In this study the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) was examined for its applicability in wetland catchment of Rugezi in Rwanda covering an area of, approximately to, 197 Km 2 . The study adopt...
The objective of this paper is to report on the issues and proposed approaches in estimating the contribution of gully erosion to sediment yield at large catchment. The case study is the upstream of Pangani River Basin (PRB) located in the North Eastern part of Tanzania. Little has been done by other researchers to study and/or extrapolate gully er...
This paper is concerned with the impact of urbanization in aquifer well-system located in the Municipalarea of Arusha city, Tanzania. A system dynamic (SD) model was built under VENSIM PLE workbench fromtwenty-five years (1978-2003) physical and non-physical data to simulate their interactions and relations.This involved use of mathematics ideas an...
This study intended to validate the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model in data scarce environment in a complex tropical catchment in the Pangani River Basin located in northeast Tanzania. The validation process involved the model initialization, calibration, verification and sensitivity analysis. Both manual and auto-calibration procedures...
Eco-hydrological studies are highly emphasized worldwide at the moment especially where hydraulic structures such as dams are concerned, mainly focusing on benefiting both humans and existing ecosystem for the present and future generations. The study at Pangani basin was aimed at assessing the sufficiency and the amount of flow reaching the downst...
The overall objective of this paper is to report on the lessons learnt from applying Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) in a well guided sediment yield modelling study. The study area is the upstream of Pangani River Basin (PRB), the Nyumba Ya Mungu (NYM) reservoir catchment, located in the North Eastern part of Tanzania. It should be noted that...
Various methods have been applied worldwide by other researchers in estimating long-term sediment yield rate at a catchment scale. The popular approaches include periodic reservoir resurvey and long term suspended sediment-sampling programmes over ten (10) years. The rating curve method is known to underestimate the actual load. Besides, for the ca...
In the subject of identifying sediment sources and erosion processes at catchment level researchers have proposed various methods. Most of the techniques have been applied in isolation. A few workers have combined some methods but still they could not ascertain their findings. As a result they recommended more sophisticated methods in order to comp...
This paper presents preliminary findings on the adequacy of one hydrological year sampling programme data in developing an excellent sediment rating curve. The study case is a 1DD1 subcatchment in the upstream of Pangani River Basin (PRB), located in the North Eastern part of Tanzania. 1DD1 is the major runoff-sediment contributing tributary to the...
The overall objective of this paper is to report on the lessons learnt from applying Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) in a well guided sediment yield modelling study. The study area is the upstream of Pangani River Basin (PRB), the Nyumba Ya Mungu (NYM) reservoir catchment, located in the North Eastern part of Tanzania. It should be noted that...
The Mara River is the lifeline of the transboundary Mara basin across Kenya and Tanzania. The basin is considered one of the more serene subcatchments of the Lake Victoria Basin and ultimately the Nile Basin, and traverses the famous Maasai Mara and Serengeti National Parks. The basin also contains forests, large-scale farms, smallholder farms, pas...
This paper presents preliminary findings on the adequacy of one hydrological year sampling programme data in developing an excellent sediment rating curve. The study case is a 1DD1 subcatchment in the upstream of Pangani River Basin (PRB), located in the North Eastern part of Tanzania. 1DD1 is the major runoff-sediment contributing tributary to the...
Introduction; Description of the study area; Methodology; Modelling Issues
Modelling Approach and Assumptions: The conceptual framework
Primary data collection technology, analysis,and approach
Results and Discussions
Conclusions and Recommendations
This paper presents some preliminary findings on the applicability of hydrologic complex model, Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT), in Kikuletwa sub-catchment in Pangani River basin located in the NorthEastern part of Tanzania. Some previous researchers have shaded doubts on the applicability of complex models such as SWAT in our region because...
Virtual water is the amount of water required for the production of a commodity. Trading commodities implies Virtual Water Trade (VWT). This study was conducted to determine the VWT derived from intra-regional trade of six cereals (maize, paddy rice, millet, sorghum, wheat and barley) for ten countries within Eastern Africa from 1998 to 2003. It in...
This research paper focused on estimating effective water and optimization of the NyM reservoir for storageconservation and hydropower generation. Several models were used in the study: the Rainfall-Runoff model, GFFS wasused to fill in missing data, and the HEC-ResSim Model and the NWBM for reservoir system simulation and waterbalance respectively...