Review on Rock Aquifers Researches Conducted in Malaysia

The exploration of groundwater in Malaysia was not very welcomed due to few misconceptions such as it is very expensive to extract, could give negative impacts to the environment and not reliable. Yet, in recent times, rock aquifers such as limestone, sedimentary rocks, volcanic rocks, igneous rocks and metasedimetary rocks are being explored. This paper aims to review the researches that have been carried out on rock aquifers in Malaysia. In general, the topics studied were potential zonation, groundwater quality and quantity, occurrence and flow of groundwater as well as characterization of rock aquifers. The highest yielding aquifer was metasedimentary rock aquifers meanwhile the quality was good in general. Most of the aquifers were having neutral pH values and the total dissolved solids more than 100 mg/l. Moreover, granitic aquifers contained more hardness than the metasedimentary rocks. The iron content in the aquifers was higher than the limit set by World Health Organisation which is 0.3mg/l while salinity of aquifers were not tested in many aquifers. It can be vividly seen that many research were focused on quality. Hence, more researches on characterization of rock aquifers must be done for proper understanding on occurrence, flow and recharge.