Delineation of Groundwater Prospective Zones Using Multivariate and Spatial Analysis Techniques in Henan Province North China Plain

Groundwater is an essential resource that meets all of humanity's daily water demands, supports industrial development, influences agricultural output, and maintains ecological equilibrium. The objective behind this research is to find groundwater prospective zones and their sustainable development in Henan Province, located in the North China Plain, with the help of analytical hierarchical process (AHP) and frequency ratio (FR) models. Consequently, a groundwater inventory map was created, utilizing 70% of the data for training and 30% for testing purposes. The resulting maps were overlaid with groundwater levels and the locations of wells within the study area. The performance and validation of the models were assessed using the Area Under Curve (AUC) curve, which indicated an accuracy of 70% for the AHP model and 69% for the FR model. The study indicates that areas with suitable gradients and rainfall patterns generally have high groundwater prospective zonation (GWPZ), i.e., Zhumadian and Nanyang (ZN). However, AHP demonstrated a higher predictive capability in comparison to FR the broader context. Whereas GIS-RS methodology aligns with existing wells and field data that validate it in range of good and excellent. In conclusion, this study provides valuable insights for effective groundwater exploration and sustainable water supply planning in Henan Province.