Science of the Total Environment 650 (2019) 1392–1402

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Science of the Total Environment

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Assessment of eutrophication and water quality in the estuarine area of

Lake Wuli, Lake Taihu, China
Junli Wang, Zishi Fu, Hongxia Qiao, Fuxing Liu ⁎
Eco-environmental Protection Research Institute, Shanghai Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Shanghai 201403, PR China
Shanghai Engineering Research Centre of Low-carbon Agriculture (SERCLA), Shanghai 201415, PR China

H I G H L I G H T S G R A P H I C A L A B S T R A C T

• Eutrophication and status of water qual-

ity were assessed in the estuarial area of
Lake Wuli.
• Differences were observed between
seasons and three different parts of
Lake Wuli.
• The wet season experienced worse eu-
trophication and water quality than the
dry season.
• East Wuli had worse eutrophication and
water quality status than the other parts
of the lake.
• WQImin had stricter standards than WQI
when analyzing water quality in this
research.

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Our study assessed the actual water situation in the estuarine area of Lake Wuli, Meiliang Bay, Lake Taihu, China,
Received 14 June 2018 based on eutrophication levels and status of water quality using the trophic level index (TLI) and water quality
Received in revised form 24 August 2018 index (WQI) methods. In the wet (August 2017) and dry (March 2018) seasons, 22 estuarine areas were tested
Accepted 10 September 2018
at 69 sampling sites, which included lake and rivers. Five parameters—chlorophyll a (Chl-a), total phosphorus
Available online 11 September 2018
(TP), total nitrogen (TN), Secchi disk (SD) and permanganate index (CODMn)—were measured to calculate the
Keywords:
TLI, and 15 parameters—temperature (T), pH, electrical conductivity (EC), dissolved oxygen (DO), total dissolved
Water quality solids (TDS), TN, TP, ammonium (NH4-N), nitrate (NO3-N), nitrite (NO2-N), CODMn, calcium (Ca2+), magnesium
Eutrophication (Mg2+), chloride (Cl−) and phosphate (PO4-P)—were measured to calculate the WQI. The average TLI and WQI
TLI values in the wet season were 61.69 and 60.70, respectively, and the eutrophication level and water quality status
WQI were worse than that in the dry season (TLI: 57.40, WQI: 65.74). Significant differences were observed between
Lake Wuli three parts of Lake Wuli (West, Middle and East). Regardless of wet or dry season, East Wuli had worse eutrophi-
Estuarine area cation levels and water quality status than the other parts, whereas West Wuli showed less severe levels. DO, TN
and CODMn used in the minimum WQI (WQImin) were the most effective parameters in our study. WQImin had
stricter standards than WQI when analyzing water quality in the estuarine area of Wulihu. Factor analysis from
principal component analysis (PCA) indicated that N might be the main factor affecting water quality of the
most eastern sites in the wet season, and P may be the main factor in the dry season. Our results provide a valu-
able contribution to inform decision-making for the management of water environments by providing the actual
water situation of the estuarine area of Lake Wuli.
© 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

⁎ Corresponding author at: Eco-environmental Protection Research Institute, Shanghai Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Shanghai, 201403, PR China.
E-mail addresses: wangjunli@saas.sh.cn (J. Wang), qiaohongxia@saas.sh.cn (H. Qiao), liufuxing@126.com (F. Liu).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.09.137
0048-9697/© 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
 J. Wang et al. / Science of the Total Environment 650 (2019) 1392–1402
1. Introduction
Anthropogenic development of the Lake Taihu Basin in China has led
to considerable pollution of lake ecosystems. Lake Taihu, located in the
center of the basin, provides the main source of drinking water for
Wuxi and Suzhou, Jiangsu Province, and is the main water supply for
Shanghai and East Zhejiang province, but it has experienced numerous
ecological problems since the 1960s, particularly eutrophication and
cyanobacterial blooms (Qin et al., 2007; Paerl et al., 2011). Water quality
of Lake Taihu has improved to some degree due to water pollution
control since the 1980s (Chen et al., 2003); however, rapid urbanization
in surrounding areas has still resulted in polluted water discharge into
the water network around the lake. Meiliang Bay, which is located in
the north part of Lake Taihu, is one of the most seriously polluted
areas (Yan et al., 2016). Thus, pollution control and regional manage-
ment in Meiliang Bay present significant challenges for the Chinese
government.
Lake estuaries represent the transition area for water flow exchange
between rivers and lakes, and the estuarine ecosystem is relatively frag-
ile and sensitive to environmental factors, such as water dynamics and
human activities. Estuaries usually accumulate large quantities of
land-sourced pollutants through water flow and sediment deposition
(Guan et al., 2009). Due to advantageous geographical positions, estua-
rine regions are also subject to socioeconomic development and may
have to withstand high pressure due to anthropogenic disturbance
(Barbier and Silliman, 2011). Because of the natural variability of estua-
rine ecosystems, there are some structural and functional problems lim-
iting, some species are not capable of developing with habitat
degradation (Elliott and Whitfield, 2011). A number of construction
projects, such as sluices and dams have decreased the degree of connec-
tivity between river and lake ecosystems and altered hydrodynamic
conditions and corresponding ecosystem responses (Wan and Konyha,
2015). For example, the ecological environment of the estuaries of
Lake Wuli, a part of Meiliang Bay in the urban area of Wuxi City, Jiangsu
Province, has experienced an evidently deteriorating trend due to over-
exploitation. In order to establish a healthy water ecosystem and restore
species diversity, it is important to identify the actual status of its estu-
aries. Based on the findings, it may be possible to develop targeted mea-
sures to restore these fragile water ecosystems.
Understanding the trophic status of lakes provides an indication of
an ecosystem's current structure and function, which facilitates the pre-
diction of future trends in an ever-changing environment, and this in-
formation can be used to formulate appropriate mitigation strategies.
Appropriate methodologies are essential to improve eutrophication.
The Chinese National Environment Monitoring Center has recom-
mended a method based on a trophic level index (TLI), which is de-
signed to identify nutrition levels in lakes (China Environmental
Monitoring Station, 2001). The TLI method has been employed widely
by integrating the simplicity of univariate analysis with the accuracy
of multivariate analysis (Liu et al., 2011). In general, the trophic levels
of lakes are assessed using five main indicators of responses to nutri-
tion: Chl-a (chlorophyll a), TP (total phosphorus), TN (total nitrogen),
SD (Secchi disk) and CODMn (permanganate index) (Xiang et al.,
2014). TLI was proposed based on Chl-a and the analysis of other indi-
cators by means of desirable, correlation generated results. The index
has been widely applied in research on eutrophication in lakes in New
Zealand and China, such as Lake Hayes, Lake Okareka, Lake Oligotrophic,
Lake Chaohu and Lake Dongting (Burns et al., 2000; Xiang et al., 2014;
Trolle et al., 2014; Zhi et al., 2016). The purpose of TLI application is to
predict the effects of potential management interventions leading to re-
duced algal blooms and increased water clarity. However, determining
and measuring the five eutrophication indicators still leads to many un-
certainties in estuarine areas, particularly estuaries close to cities. It
should be possible to obtain more valuable information to assist deci-
sion makers in ecological management and for accurate measurement
of water quality.
1393
Analysis of water quality is an important factor in elucidating how
man-made activities affect the ecological integrity of an estuarine area.
High nutrients and pollutants are transported by rivers and lakes and
accumulate in estuaries, which receive land and water pollution loads
from various sources (Gopal et al., 2018). In order to evaluate the base-
line water quality of aquatic ecosystems, a water quality index (WQI)
has been recommended, which is based on a simple expression of the
general water quality by a single number, which summarizes large
quantities of water quality data (Debels et al., 2005). WQI is a very use-
ful and practical tool to classify surface waters or to assess pollution
levels in a water body (Lermontov et al., 2011; Bakan et al., 2010). More-
over, WQI can identify the changing trends in water quality and it can
facilitate comparisons between different sampling sites (Sun et al.,
2016). Using the WQI method, Pesce and Wunderlin (2000) assessed
the effect of urban discharge on the water quality of Suquya River in
Argentina; Kannel et al. (2007) evaluated spatial and temporal changes
of water quality in Bagmati River, Nepal; Sánchez et al. (2007) assessed
the pollution levels along the Guadarrama and Manzanares rivers in
Spain; Simoes et al. (2008) investigated the effects of aquaculture on
Macuco and Queixada rivers, Brazil; Kocer and Sevgili (2014) and
Sener et al. (2017) assessed the environmental impacts of land-based
trout farms on Esen Stream and spatial variations in water quality of
Aksu River in Turkey, and Wu et al. (2018) evaluated the spatial changes
in river water quality in Lake Taihu Basin, China. The WQI method can
convert multiple water quality parameters into a single value which re-
flects the actual status of the environment. Thus, application of the WQI
method to evaluate estuarine water quality is an effective approach to
providing integrated information for managers, instead of comparing a
large number of results of various parameters. However, the evaluation
of WQI generally requires the measurement of a considerable number of
parameters, whereas minimum WQI (WQImin) generally uses a limited
number of parameters (3 or 5), yet it shows high linear correlation with
WQI (Akkoyunlu and Akiner, 2012; Sánchez et al., 2007). In this re-
search, the key parameters representing water quality used for WQImin
were also analyzed for simple and cost-effective water assessment in
the estuarine area of Lake Wuli.
Lake Wuli estuaries are located beside cities, whose hydrology and
water quality are subjected to multiple impacts from regional geology
and human activity. In this study, the actual water situation of the estu-
aries of Lake Wuli were determined by collecting 69 water samples from
22 estuarine areas in wet and dry seasons (August 2017, March 2018).
The objectives of this study were (1) to assess the level of eutrophica-
tion using TLI, and (2) to classify the water quality status using WQI
and to evaluate spatial and seasonal differences across the estuaries.
The purpose of the study is to provide valuable information for govern-
ments and environmental managers by appropriately describing the
variations in eutrophication levels and status of water quality of Lake
Wuli estuaries.
2. Materials and methods
2.1. Study area
Lake Wuli (31°30′07″–31°32′48″N, 120°15′11″–120°13′54″E) is lo-
cated in Meiliang Bay, north of Lake Taihu (Fig. 1A) and it encompasses
a surface area of 8.6 km2. It is about 6 km from east to west, 0.3–1.2 km
from north to south and 21 km in circumference. The lake is part of
Meiliang Bay extending into the urban area of Wuxi City, which is the
second largest city in the Jiangsu Province of China. Wuxi, a highly pop-
ulated and developed area, occupies an important position in the Lake
Taihu Basin; the population is 4.86 million and gross domestic product
(GDP) reached RMB 921 billion in 2016 (Wuxi Yearbook, 2017). As lo-
cated in a subtropical monsoon climate zone, southeast wind mainly oc-
curs in summer while northwest wind prevails in winter. Average
annual temperature of Wuxi is 18.0 °C (12.2–20.1 °C), and average
1394 J. Wang et al. / Science of the Total Environment 650 (2019) 1392–1402
Fig. 1. Location of study area in Lake Taihu, China (A) and water sampling sites of Lake Wuli estuaries (B). Notes: No.#(No.) means estuarine number # (sampling numbers); No.-No. in-
dicates water sampling sites.
annual precipitation is 843.6 mm. In Jiangsu Province, Wuxi is the only
urban area around Lake Taihu; the rest are agricultural counties.
In the study area, 22 lakeshore estuaries were investigated; the riv-
ers all connect to Lake Wuli and they are distributed across Wuxi city
(Fig. 1B). From the most northern estuary in Lake Wuli, 1 to 22 were
numbered clockwise: Xiaoxuanhe (1#), Ludianqiaobang (2#),
Huangjiabianbang (3#), Chendahe (4#), Xuxiangbang (5#),
Hutianzhuangbang (6#), Lixihe (7#), Dongxuxiangbang (8#),
Wangxiangbang (9#), Miaojingbang (10#), Maligang (11#), Lucunhe
(12#), Weitianlihe (13#), Liangtanghe (14#), Dongguxiangbang
(15#), Donghuwaihe (16#), Shangfengzuibang (17#), Weinisihenghe
(18#), Zhangzhuangxianghe (19#), Xitiexiangbang (20#), Qitangbang
(21#) and Chongshanhe (22#). Lake Wuli was divided into three
parts: West Wuli (sampling locations of 1#, 2#, 3#, 22#), Middle Wuli
(sampling locations of 4#, 5#, 6#, 7#, 8#, 17#, 18#, 19#, 20#, 21#)
and East Wuli (sampling locations of 9#, 10#, 11#, 12#, 13#, 14#,
15#, 16#). In the estuarine area, most of the 22 rivers flowing into
Lake Wuli are controlled by gates or dams; the gate or dam condition,
water flow status and water sampling sites for each estuary are listed
in the supplementary materials (Table S1). The land use varies along
the rivers in the scope of the study area. For the lake side of each estuary,
lands for sights dominated 22 rivers. For the river side of estuaries,
residential and commercial lands or other public lands were mainly
observed.
According to monitoring data in 2000, the water quality of Lake Wuli
was classified as inferior V (GB 3838-2002, Ministry of Environmental
Protection of China, 2002), and the concentration of total nitrogen
(TN), total phosphorus (TP) and permanganate index (CODMn) reached
up to 6.6, 0.2 and 8.1 mg L−1, respectively. Lake Wuli experienced the
worst outbreaks of cyanobacteria bloom in 2000. As such, the State
Council designated it as a priority lake for remediation (Wang and
Wang, 2014). In 2003, an ecological restoration project was imple-
mented and sediment dredging was performed in the whole lake to re-
duce internal nutrient loading (Chen et al., 2009). After nearly three
years' effort, the water quality was evidently improved; by 2005, the
concentrations of TN, TP and CODMn were 5.6, 0.14 and 5.6 mg L−1, re-
spectively. In order to protect the improved water quality and to facili-
tate water diversion, gates or dams were built in the rivers connected to
Lake Wuli. The lakeshore estuaries are special areas formed by the inter-
section of lake and river, which is affected by the dual influence of lake
and river waters which, in turn, affects the water quality of both lake
and river. But the construction of gates and dams has obstructed the hy-
drodynamic process, and this has affected the exchange process be-
tween the rivers and lakes.
 J. Wang et al. / Science of the Total Environment 650 (2019) 1392–1402
2.2. Sample collection and laboratory analysis
Sixty-nine sampling sites covering 22 rivers were carefully selected
to represent the whole estuarine area of Lake Wuli. Taking into account
the variations of seasons, two sampling events were conducted in a wet
(August 2017) and dry (March 2018) season. In order to minimize the
effects of weather, efforts were made to collect the samples in sunny
conditions. The sampling site of 10-4 was disrupted by construction in
March 2018, so there was no sampling of this site in the dry season.
Water parameters in situ, including pH, water temperature (T), dis-
solved oxygen (DO), total dissolved solids (TDS) and electrical conduc-
tivity (EC) were obtained using a multi-parameter water quality
analyzer (HI9829, Hanna, Italy). Transparency was measured by a
Secchi disc (SD), and chlorophyll a (Chl-a) was determined using a chlo-
rophyll a fluorescence detector (FuloroQuik, AMI, USA). Then, mixed
water samples from three replications in each sampling site were col-
lected in 500 mL plastic bottles, which were rinsed with surface water
before sampling. After sampling, all bottles were transferred to the lab-
oratory, stored in a refrigerator and analyzed as soon as possible. TN, TP
and CODMn were analyzed according to the standard Chinese method
(Standard Method for the Examination of Water and Wastewater
Editorial Board, 2002). The concentrations of ammonium (NH4-N), ni-
trate (NO3-N), nitrite (NO2-N) and phosphate (PO4-P) were measured
by a continuous flow analytical system (AA3, Seal, Germany). The con-
centrations of calcium (Ca2+), magnesium (Mg2+) and chloride (Cl−)
were measured using a 930 Compact ICFlex ion chromatograph
(Metrohm, Switzerland).
2.3. Trophic level index (TLI) calculations
The trophic condition of the estuarine area of Lake Wuli was
assessed using TLI values (China Environmental Monitoring Station,
2001). For both qualitative and quantitative aspects, TLI is a weighted
sum based on the correlations between Chl-a and other substances.
Chl-a, TP, TN, SD and CODMn were used to calculate the TLI, and formulas
of each were established as follows:
TLI ðChl−aÞ ¼ 10½2:5 þ 1:086lnðChl−aÞ
TLI ðTPÞ ¼ 10½9:436 þ 1:624lnðTPÞ
TLI ðTNÞ ¼ 10½5:453 þ 1:694lnðTNÞ
TLI ðSDÞ ¼ 10½5:118−1:94 ln ðSDÞ
TLI ðCODMn Þ ¼ 10½0:109 þ 2:661lnðCODMn Þ
where the unit of Chl-a is mg m−3; the units of TP, TN and CODMn are
mg L−1, and SD represents the Secchi disk, where the unit is m. The
TLI equation was calculated as follows using the national standard:
X Xm
TLI ¼ W j  TLIð jÞ
j¼1
X
m
W j ¼ r2ij = r 2ij
j¼1
where TLI(j) is the composite index of j with the correlative weight Wj;
rij is the correlation coefficients between the reference Chl-a and each
parameter j (Chl-a, 1; TP, 0.84; TN, 0.82; SD, −0.83; CODMn, 0.83), and
m is the number of indicators. The rij value was obtained from the 26
main lake survey data sets for China (Jin et al., 1995).
The TLI ranges from 0 to 100, with high values representing high eu-
trophication levels. Trophic status is classified into five grades based on
the TLI(∑) scores: oligotropher (TLI(∑) b 30), mesotropher (30 ≤ TLI
(∑) ≤ 50), light eutropher (50 b TLI(∑) ≤ 60), middle eutropher (60
1395
b TLI(∑) ≤ 70) and hyper eutropher (TLI(∑) N 70). The eutrophication
status of each sampling site was calculated from the TLI value.
2.4. Water quality index (WQI) calculations
In order to evaluate the water quality status more objectively, the
water quality of the estuarine area of Lake Wuli was assessed using
water quality index (WQI) values. The WQI is used to summarize differ-
ent water quality parameters converted from large quantities of data
into a single number. Fifteen parameters of T, pH, EC, DO, TDS, TN,
NH4-N, NO3-N, NO2-N, TP, PO4-P, CODMn, Ca2+, Mg2+ and Cl− were
used to calculate the WQI; the equation used here was proposed by
Pesce and Wunderlin (2000) as follows:
X
n X
n
WQI ¼ C i Pi = Pi ð8Þ
i¼1 i¼1
where n is the total number of parameters, Ci is the normalization value
assigned to parameter i, and Pi is the relative weight assigned from 1 to
4 to parameter i (Table S2). The WQI values graded the water quality,
ranging from 1 to 100: in range of N90 is excellent, (70–90] is good,
(50–70] is medium, [25–50] is poor, and b25 is very poor. For each
site, the WQI values were averaged to determine the spatial and sea-
sonal WQI value.
In order to assess the status of water quality of Lake Wuli estuarine
areas in a more simple and cost-effective way, a WQImin method was
considered in the study according to the equation below (Pesce and
Wunderlin, 2000):
X
n
WQImin ¼ C i =n ð9Þ
i¼1
where n is the total number of parameters, and Ci is the value after nor-
malization (Table S2). The selection of parameters used in WQImin was
based on the results of linear regression analysis. All 137 samplings col-
lected in wet (69 samplings) and dry (68 samplings) seasons were used
to calculate the selected water parameters and the relationship between
ð1Þ WQI and WQImin.
ð2Þ 2.5. Data analysis
ð3Þ All statistical analyses were performed with SPSS statistical software
(IBM SPSS Statistics Ver. 22.0). Significant differences between the
ð4Þ
mean values of water parameters at the spatial and seasonal scales
were evaluated with Kruskal-Wallis tests. Significant differences due
ð5Þ
to lake locations and seasons on indexes were determined by one-way
analysis of variance (ANOVA) with a general linear model, using the
LSD test at 5% significance level. In order to test the response of main
water parameters to WQI, stepwise multiple linear regression analyses
were carried out to calculate WQImin, including 15 parameters used in
WQI. Pearson correlation analysis was performed to detect relationships
ð6Þ between WQI with TLI and WQImin. The TLI and WQI maps were con-
structed by ArcGIS (Ver. 10.2) software using the inverse distance
weighting method. Factor analysis and drawing using a principal com-
ð7Þ ponent analysis (PCA) method was performed using SIMCA software
(Ver. 14.1).
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Water variables in the estuarine area of Lake Wuli
Water variables can reflect changes in watersheds of rivers, and two
of the most important factors affecting water variables are regional ge-
ology and human activity (Yang et al., 2012). A statistical summary of
the water variables measured at all sampling sites for the estuaries of
Lake Wuli in wet and dry seasons is provided in Table 1. It shows that
1396 J. Wang et al. / Science of the Total Environment 650 (2019) 1392–1402

Table 1
Water variables summarized at all sampling sites for the three parts of Lake Wuli in wet and dry seasons.

Parameter Wet season Statistics Dry season Statistics

West Wuli Middle Wuli East Wuli H P West Wuli Middle Wuli East Wuli H P
(n = 13) (n = 28) (n = 28) (n = 13) (n = 28) (n = 27)

T (°C) 30.23 ± 0.62 30.30 ± 0.51 30.28 ± 0.43 0.064 0.968 10.31 ± 0.51b 10.74 ± 0.49a 10.65 ± 0.51ab 7.497 0.024
pH 7.40 ± 0.16 7.35 ± 0.28 7.36 ± 0.15 1.017 0.601 7.86 ± 0.23a 7.61 ± 0.23b 7.63 ± 0.19b 11.493 0.003
EC (μS cm−1) 385.65 ± 41.96b 414.39 ± 48.31b 443.86 ± 79.56a 6.541 0.038 325.69 ± 58.38b 356.39 ± 53.65b 390.11 ± 53.74a 14.398 0.001
DO (mg L−1) 5.25 ± 0.73a 4.58 ± 1.50a 3.45 ± 2.15b 8.856 0.012 7.16 ± 2.21a 4.21 ± 2.30b 4.34 ± 3.01b 10.881 0.004
TDS (mg L−1) 246.69 ± 41.39b 300.79 ± 93.11a 288.46 ± 78.03ab 2.999 0.223 225.77 ± 40.97b 252.04 ± 37.39a 268.56 ± 36.63a 11.778 0.003
SD (m) 0.55 ± 0.13a 0.46 ± 0.13b 0.43 ± 0.10b 8.383 0.015 0.72 ± 0.15a 0.53 ± 0.15b 0.49 ± 0.16b 14.600 0.001
Chl-a (mg m−3) 29.19 ± 7.51 36.91 ± 20.09 40.02 ± 22.24 1.873 0.392 6.59 ± 4.33b 12.72 ± 10.24ab 16.08 ± 12.39a 7.112 0.029
TN (mg L−1) 1.24 ± 0.36b 1.71 ± 0.66b 5.23 ± 5.57a 27.708 b0.001 0.97 ± 0.61b 2.29 ± 2.15a 2.81 ± 1.73a 15.276 b0.001
NH4-N (mg L−1) 0.46 ± 0.40b 0.60 ± 0.57b 4.09 ± 5.62a 25.353 b0.001 0.25 ± 0.17b 0.96 ± 1.26b 1.97 ± 1.89a 18.351 b0.001
NO3-N (mg L−1) 0.17 ± 0.16b 0.32 ± 0.21b 0.58 ± 0.52a 8.153 0.017 0.44 ± 0.38ab 0.77 ± 0.94a 0.41 ± 0.24b 4.113 0.128
NO2-N (mg L−1) 0.10 ± 0.10b 0.22 ± 0.18a 0.15 ± 0.16ab 7.360 0.025 0.15 ± 0.10 0.15 ± 0.14 0.18 ± 0.15 0.268 0.875
TP (mg L−1) 0.08 ± 0.05b 0.27 ± 0.53ab 0.42 ± 0.44a 19.742 b0.001 0.02 ± 0.01b 0.12 ± 0.10ab 0.18 ± 0.23a 17.455 b0.001
PO4-P (mg L−1) 0.03 ± 0.01 0.12 ± 0.28 0.12 ± 0.13 19.315 b0.001 0.01 ± 0.01b 0.03 ± 0.02ab 0.05 ± 0.06a 14.091 0.001
CODMn (mg L−1) 4.44 ± 0.99b 4.78 ± 1.13b 8.33 ± 6.02a 10.945 0.004 2.98 ± 0.31c 4.02 ± 0.74b 5.06 ± 1.75a 19.332 b0.001
Ca2+ (mg L−1) 17.73 ± 2.53 20.28 ± 4.72 20.18 ± 4.30 2.468 0.291 17.32 ± 3.84b 20.98 ± 5.44a 20.49 ± 4.63ab 4.239 0.120
Mg2+ (mg L−1) 25.28 ± 7.32 20.90 ± 6.30 22.76 ± 9.17 2.996 0.224 24.84 ± 5.78 21.75 ± 9.16 23.70 ± 14.39 3.108 0.211
Cl− (mg L−1) 27.78 ± 2.27b 35.50 ± 12.39a 38.18 ± 9.54a 16.564 b0.001 31.44 ± 2.38b 35.55 ± 7.66b 43.78 ± 10.46a 25.551 b0.001

Notes: West Wuli included sampling locations of 1#, 2#, 3#, 22#; Middle Wuli included sampling locations of 4#, 5#, 6#, 7#, 8#, 17#, 18#, 19#, 20#, 21#, and East Wuli included sampling
locations of 9#, 10#, 11#, 12#, 13#, 14#, 15#, 16#. Mean values ± standard deviations with different letters (a, b and c) are significantly different (P b 0.05) between the three parts of Lake
Wuli in the same season.

most water parameters of the estuarine area varied at a statistically sig-
nificant level between the three parts of Lake Wuli in two seasons. EC is
directly related to the concentration of dissolved solids in the water, and
high EC values are caused by contaminants in surface waters. In our
study, regardless of wet or dry season, the changes in EC values were al-
ways East Wuli N Middle Wuli N West Wuli. Biological changes by aero-
bic or anaerobic organisms were determined by the factor DO, where
the value of 4 to 6 mg L−1 is proven to show healthy aquatic life in
water (Avvannavar and Shrihari, 2008). SD indicates the clarity of the
water, reflecting the concentrations of suspended matter. TDS usually
has a good correspondence with the hardness and conductivity of
water. In the wet season, the average DO (5.25 mg L−1) and SD
(0.55 m) were highest in West Wuli, followed by Middle Wuli, and
the lowest values were observed in East Wuli (DO, 3.45 mg L−1; SD,
0.43 m), while TDS in the dry season showed the opposite trend. In
the dry season, the average DO (7.16 mg L−1) and SD (0.72 m) in
West Wuli were also highest among the three parts of Lake Wuli, and
the lowest DO (4.21 mg L−1) and SD (0.49 m) occurred in Middle and
East Wuli, respectively. The Chl-a level in water reflects the biomass of
phytoplankton. The mean Chl-a values in East Wuli in the wet and dry
seasons were 40.02 and 16.08 mg m−3, respectively, which were higher
than the other two parts of Lake Wuli. Chl-a in West Wuli was the low-
est; the values were 29.19 and 6.59 mg m−3 in the wet and dry seasons,
respectively.
Excessive nitrogen, phosphorus and organic matter are some of the
main causes of water pollution. The nutrient concentrations were rela-
tively high in East Wuli in the two seasons. In the wet season, the
mean TN, NH4-N and TP were 5.23, 4.09 and 0.42 mg L−1 in East Wuli,
respectively. According to China's environmental quality standards for
surface water (GB 3838-2002), the water quality was classified as infe-
rior V level. At this level, the concentration of TN, NH4-N and TP should
be below 2.00, 2.00 and 0.20 mg L−1, respectively. In the dry season, the
values of TN, NH4-N and TP were 2.81, 1.97 and 0.18 mg L−1 in East
Wuli, respectively, and only TN was classified as inferior V level. The
mean concentration of TN, NH4-N and TP were lowest in West Wuli
with values of 1.24, 0.46 and 0.08 mg L−1 in the wet season, and 0.97,
0.25 and 0.02 mg L−1 in the dry season, respectively. N and P are com-
ponents of domestic sewage. East Wuli area is situated in the old district
of Wuxi City with large population, and West Wuli area is located in nat-
ural parks with little human intervention. The discharge of domestic
sewage leaded to higher N and P concentrations in east part than in
west part of Lake Wuli. Based on earlier study about the water environ-
ment in Lake Taihu (Zhu, 2008), the average concentrations of TN and
TP in Lake Taihu were approximately 2 and 0.1 mg L−1, respectively.
In the research, whether in the wet season (TN, 3.05 mg L−1; TP,
0.29 mg L−1) or in the dry season (TN, 2.24 mg L−1; TP, 0.12 mg L−1),
the mean concentrations of TN and TP in our research area were always
higher than that in the Lake Taihu. Due to the man-made activities and
the dual affect by rivers and lakes, the pollutions accumulated in estuar-
ies (Gopal et al., 2018), which might lead to the higher N and P concen-
trations. It was reported that in Meiliang Bay, N was the main source of
pollution, and TN concentrations were significantly higher than TP con-
centrations (N7:1) (Chen et al., 2003). In our study, the TN:TP ratio
reached 15.5 and 29.2 in the wet and dry seasons averaged across all
sampling sites, which indicated that N continued to accumulate in the
estuarine area of the lake. Nutrient concentration parameters showed
the most significant variation (P b 0.05) among the three parts of Lake
Wuli in two seasons, except for NO3-N and NO2-N in the dry season.
CODMn usually reflects pollution by organic and inorganic oxidizable
substances in water. In East Wuli, the mean concentrations of CODMn
were 8.33 and 5.06 mg L−1 in the wet and dry season, respectively.
The values were significantly higher than in the other two parts of
Lake Wuli. In West Wuli, CODMn had the lowest values of 4.44 and
2.98 mg L−1 in the wet and dry seasons, respectively. Although East
Wuli had the highest CODMn level, it appears that organic matters
were not the main polluting substances in the estuarine area of Lake
Wuli.
Ca2+ and Mg2+ are usually the dominant cations in river waters
(Chatterjee et al., 2010). The Ca2+ and Mg2+ concentrations did not dif-
fer significantly either in the wet or dry season between the three parts
of Lake Wuli. The permissible limit of Mg2+ is 30 mg L−1 according to
drinking water standards (World Health Organisation, 1996), and the
average Mg2+ concentration in the estuarine area did not exceed this
limit. Average Cl− concentration had locational trends of East
N Middle N West of Lake Wuli in two seasons. It has been reported
that the high values of Cl− in water may result from pollution by anthro-
pogenic activity and domestic sewage waste (Chatterjee et al., 2010).
Pearson linear correlation generated using 17 water parameters (T,
pH, EC, DO, TDS, SD, Chl-a, TN, NH4-N, NO3-N, NO2-N, TP, PO4-P,
CODMn, Ca2+, Mg2+, Cl−) are shown in Table S3.
 J. Wang et al. / Science of the Total Environment 650 (2019) 1392–1402
3.2. Eutrophication assessment based on the TLI
Meiliang Bay used to be the most severely eutrophicated area of Lake
Taihu, which had higher nutrient concentrations (e.g., inorganic and or-
ganic forms of N and P) than other areas of the lake (Cai et al., 2010). Al-
though cyanobacterial blooms have not occurred in current years in
Lake Wuli, eutrophication assessment is still necessary to prevent
them in the future, especially in the anthropogenically influenced estu-
arine area. TLI was usually introduced as an index for describing the eu-
trophication status of water. In this study, the TLI (based on Chl-a, TP,
TN, SD and CODMn) showed variations in values from 48.63 to 89.76 in
the estuarine area of Lake Wuli in the wet season (Fig. 2A), and from
45.00 to 72.01 in the dry season (Fig. 2B). The final TLI map of the estu-
arine area was prepared using ArcGIS and it is presented in Fig. 3. The
range in TLI between the two seasons represents a shift of four trophic
levels, from hyper eutropher to mesotropher. Overall, the TLI of West
Wuli samples was lower than that of Middle Wuli samples, which was
lower than East Wuli samples. There were significant (P b 0.05) spatial
(west, middle and east) and seasonal (wet and dry) effects on the TLI
Fig. 2. Spatial and seasonal variations of TLI, WQI and WQImin in the estuarine area of Lake Wuli. Notes: Different letters (a, b, and c) indicate significant difference (P b 0.05) between mean
values.
1397
of Lake Wuli. The mean TLI in the wet season in West Wuli was 55.10,
and almost all sampling sites reached light eutrophic levels except 1-1
(mesotropher), while in the dry season the average TLI decreased to
42.94, and all sampling sites were mesotrophic levels. In Middle Wuli,
the mean TLI in the wet season was 59.75, and four trophic levels
were recorded: 7.1% of sampling sites reached hyper eutrophic levels,
39.3% reached middle eutrophic levels, 50.0% reached light eutrophic
levels, and only 3.9% were mesotropher. In the dry season, the average
TLI in Middle Wuli was 52.98 and the number of trophic levels de-
creased to three; 14.3% reached middle eutrophic levels, 57.1% reached
light eutrophic levels, and 28.6% were mesotropher. The mean TLI in the
wet season in East Wuli reached 66.68, and hyper, middle and light eu-
trophic levels accounted for 28.6%, 50.0% and 21.4%, respectively. In the
dry season, the average TLI decreased to 58.85, and hyper, middle, light
eutropher, and mesotrophic levels accounted for 3.7%, 33.3%, 37.0% and
26.0%, respectively. Temperature is considered to be one of the primary
factors determining the seasonal dynamics of eutrophication level
(Herb and Stefan, 2003). It was reported that in the winter, with de-
creasing temperatures, the dominance of algae obviously decreased
1398 J. Wang et al. / Science of the Total Environment 650 (2019) 1392–1402

Fig. 3. The spatial distributions of TLI in estuarine area of Lake Wuli in wet (August 2017, A) and dry (March 2018, B) seasons.

Fig. 4. The spatial distributions of WQI (A and B) and WQImin (C and D) in the estuarine area of Lake Wuli in wet (August 2017) and dry (March 2018) seasons.
 J. Wang et al. / Science of the Total Environment 650 (2019) 1392–1402
(Jiang et al., 2018). As water temperature in the research changed from
30.28 °C in the wet season to 10.62 °C in the dry season, the eutrophica-
tion level decreased. The increase in the severity of eutrophication will
damage the function of the water body and may even harm the entire
ecological system (Paerl and Paul, 2012). However, regardless of wet
or dry season, the eutrophication state was more serious in East Wuli,
compared to Middle and West Wuli. Eutrophication remediation mea-
sures should be more focused in the east part of Lake Wuli.
3.3. Water quality assessment based on the WQI
WQI was used in our study in order to evaluate the overall status of
water quality. WQI assembles data from regular parameters of water
quality and provides a value with an understandable explanation of
water quality in a specific area and time (Hoseinzadeh et al., 2015). In
our study, the WQI value was calculated by T, pH, EC, DO, TDS, TN,
NH4-N, NO3-N, NO2-N, TP, PO4-P, CODMn, Ca2+, Mg2+ and Cl− for each
sampling site and both seasons (wet and dry). The WQI values ranged
from 40.00 to 78.08 in the wet season, and from 47.12 to 83.65 in the
dry season (Fig. 2C and D). In the wet season, 6 of 13 sites in West
Wuli were classified as good, and the others were all recorded as me-
dium (Fig. 4A). Most of the sampling sites (85.71%) in Middle Wuli
had a medium water quality status, and only 3 and 1 sampling sites
had a good and poor status, respectively. In East Wuli, 67.86% of sam-
pling sites were classified as medium, and others were all poor, which
were focused in the most eastern locations. In the dry season, the status
of water quality in the estuarine area was generally better than in the
wet season. In West and Middle Wuli, 84.62% (11 of 13) and 30.77%
(8 of 26) sampling sites were classified as good, and others were all me-
dium (Fig. 4B). In East Wuli, 33.33%, 44.44% and 22.22% of sites were
classified as good, medium and poor water quality, respectively. Addi-
tionally, no WQI value above 90 and below 25 were recorded, which
means there were neither excellent or very poor sites observed in the
estuarine area of Lake Wuli. Locations and seasons had significant ef-
fects on WQI values (P b 0.05). The seasonally variations of WQI were
potentially influenced by the physical and chemical properties of
water, such as temperature and DO (Avvannavar and Shrihari, 2008;
Jiang et al., 2018). In this study, the worse water quality in the wet sea-
son could be attributed to rainfall, which could increase surface runoff to
waters and bring more pollutions. Moreover, it was reported that an in-
crease evaporation may also lead to higher pollution concentrations
(Zhao et al., 2013). Pearson linear correlation showed that WQI had a
significant negative relationship (R2 = 0.7387, P b 0.001) with TLI
(Fig. 5). Overall, the WQI distribution map showed that, West Wuli
had relatively good water quality within the estuarine area, which
Fig. 5. Relationships between WQI with TLI and WQImin based on the testing data sets.
1399
was consistent with its location in natural parks with little human inter-
vention. Middle Wuli had relatively medium water quality within the
estuarine area, which was consistent with artificial parks with consider-
able human intervention. East Wuli is a narrow area located in old urban
areas, the accumulation of pollutants was more serious. Most of the
eastern estuarine area is situated in residential quarters with consider-
able human activity, but the density of drainage pipe network is
small; thus, the water quality deteriorated markedly.
We presented that in the estuary area of Lake Wuli, most of the 22
rivers are controlled by gates or dams, and the presence of dams has a
considerable effect on water quality characteristics (Kurunc et al.,
2006). At several estuarine locations in our study, significant differences
in river side and lake side water quality were observed, such as 1#, 2#,
3#, 5#, 11#, 12#, 13#, 19# and 20#. Due to the existence of gates or
dams, no water exchange between the lake and the rivers on these es-
tuaries (Table S1), while the river side water quality was worse than
that in the lake side because of urban activities. Karakaya and
Evrendilek (2010) found that even when no dam is present, differences
in water quality were observed due to the emissions of a variety of pol-
lutants from catchments areas. Despite the existence of enclosure in the
location of 14#, water exchange between the lake and the river, signif-
icant water quality differences in two sides of the enclosure were ob-
served due to the pollutants accumulation.
The evaluation of WQI generally requires measurement of several
parameters. The cost and time for analysis limits the acceptability of
WQI. Sun et al. (2016) reported that correlated water variables in WQI
explain high levels of variance but lack robustness; thus, it is possible
to select the main variables which can explain most of the variance in
the water quality. Pesce and Wunderlin (2000) proposed the WQImin
model, which usually uses 3 or 5 parameters to calculate WQI. Stepwise
linear regression was used in our study to screen the main water param-
eters (≤ 5), which significantly affect WQI (Table 2). It showed that TN
made the largest contribution to WQI based on the data set (R2 =
0.689, P b 0.001). DO, CODMn, NH4-N and NO2-N were selected sequen-
tially and considerably increased the R2 value of the models. Due to key
roles for the aquatic life, DO is often used as one of the 3 or 5 parameters
to calculate WQI (Kannel et al., 2007). TN concentration contains NH4-N
and NO2-N, so only TN was selected in our WQImin, and it indicated
nutrient pollution. CODMn can indicate organic pollution. Hence, TN,
DO and CODMn were established as the critical parameters in the train-
ing of WQImin. Results of our WQImin did not show greater variations
from WQI (Fig. 5B, R2 = 0.9409, P b 0.001). Although WQImin showed
a similar spatial changing trend with WQI on the water quality in the es-
tuarine area of our study, the values of WQImin were always lower than
WQI regardless of wet or dry season (Fig. 4). Therefore, WQImin might
1400 J. Wang et al. / Science of the Total Environment 650 (2019) 1392–1402
Table 2
Stepwise linear regressions of WQI with 15 water parameters examined after
normalization.
Model Linear model R2
1 54.513 + 5.192 (TN) 0.689
2 47.927 + 3.534 (TN) + 1.240 (DO) 0.902
3 39.919 + 2.907 (TN) + 1.115 (DO) + 1.465 (CODMn) 0.945
4 40.020 + 1.917 (TN) + 1.093 (DO) + 1.274 (CODMn) + 0.966
0.774 (NH4-N)
5 36.189 + 1.233 (TN) + 1.119 (DO) + 1.267 (CODMn) + 0.987 b0.001
1.086 (NH4-N) + 0.962 (NO2-N)
give stricter standards than WQI on the spatial and seasonal analysis of
the water quality in the estuarine area of Lake Wuli and provides a
simpler measurement procedure and a comparatively lower analytical
cost.
The water quality assessments using WQImin are shown in Figs. 2E, F,
4C and D. The level of WQImin in the dry season (13.33–76.67) was usu-
ally higher than the wet season (0.00–63.33). There were three and four
levels of water quality based on WQImin in the wet and dry seasons, re-
spectively, which showed very poor status in WQImin maps compared to
WQI maps. In the wet season, 2 (8–3 and 9–4) of 28 sites in Middle Wuli
were classified as very poor water quality status, and 35.71% of sampling
sites were very poor in East Wuli. In the dry season, 2 (8–2 and 9–2) of
28 sites in Middle Wuli were classified as very poor water, and in East
Wuli, the very poor ratios decreased to 29.63%. On the whole, it seems
that the most eastern location (11#, 12#, 13# and 14#) of Lake Wuli
had the worst water quality.
Fig. 6. Principal component analysis based on the water variables in wet (A and B) and dry (C and D) seasons. Note: Ellipses indicate 95% confidence limit.
3.4. Special sites analysis
Principal component analysis (PCA) method is a factor analysis
P which transforms a large number of correlated variables into a
b0.001 smaller number of underlying factors (principal component). A
b0.001 meaningful association with the variables of interest is given by the
b0.001 PCA method (Farnham et al., 2003). Therefore, PCA can achieve a sig-
b0.001
nificant reduction in the dimensionality of the original data set (Yang
et al., 2010). In our study, two PCA factors were extracted using all 17
water parameters; the total percentages of variance were 44.6% and
55.2% in the wet and dry seasons, respectively (Fig. 6A and C). Distri-
bution of the sampling sites over a bidimensional space using the
two factors' score are presented in Fig. 6B and D. Based on the results,
in the wet season, the determination from three sites found in 12#
(12-2, 12-3 and 12-4) separated from the rest of the data and dis-
persed over the bidimensional space. The water quality of the three
sites was all hyper eutropher based on TLI; poor levels were based
on WQI, and very poor levels were based on WQImin at this time.
From Fig. 6A and B, it seems that NH4-N and TN were the main factors
affecting 12-3 and 12-4, and NO3-N and NO2-N were the main factors
affecting 12-2. It has been proved that N transportation and transfor-
mation were quite different between the lake and rivers due to dis-
tinctive biochemical processes and hydrological regimes (Yu et al.,
2018). The sites of 12-3 and 12-4 were in the upstream region of
Lucunhe estuary, which was located in residential areas, subjected
to the stress of major anthropogenic activities, and the N pollution
may come mainly from domestic sewage discharge (Chen et al.,
2014). In this area, a sewage treatment plant had an impact on the
regional river, which can process 200,000 tons of water per day.
 J. Wang et al. / Science of the Total Environment 650 (2019) 1392–1402
According to discharge standard of pollutants for municipal waste-
water treatment plant (GB 18918-2002), first criterion A criterion
is the basic requirement for cycle water discharged from treatment
plant, and TN and NH4-N are applicable for 15 and 5 mg L−1, respec-
tively. Thus, TN and NH4-N discharged from sewage were about 3000
and 1000 kg per day in the related area, respectively, and there were
seven drain outlets in the region of Lucunhe, which increased water
pollution. The site of 12-2 located near the lake may be due to local
biological activities; NO3-N and NO2-N were the main effects in this
sample.
In the dry season, six sites (21-1, 21-2, 21-3, 12-4, 13-3 and 13-4)
separated from the rest of the data and were dispersed over the
bidimensional space. 21# (Qitangbang) located in Middle Wuli, was
under construction at the time of sampling. It might be an accident
that the three sites of 21# were outside of the 95% confidence limit.
Based on TLI, the 12-4 site was hyper eutropher, and the sites of 13-3
and 13-4 were at middle eutrophic level. Based on WQI and WQImin,
the three sites all had poor and very poor status, respectively. The ar-
rows in Fig. 6C and D showed that among the nutrients pollution, PO4-
P and TP might the main factors affecting the three sites in dry season.
Owing to the impact of anthropogenic activities at this location of Lake
Wuli, the sampling sites had a similar factors effect. In addition, N may
be the main factor affecting water quality of these special sites in the
wet season, and P may be the main factor in the dry season. N pollution
is severe in Lake Taihu Basin (Wang et al., 2007), and domestic sewage-
derived N contributed the major N load to the Lake Taihu (Yu et al.,
2018). Using the PCA method, Zhao et al. (2011) also found that NH4-
N highlighted the critical roles in affecting the water quality in Lake
Taihu, especially in the wet season, rainfall plays an important role in
terms of N inputs to the lake (Luo et al., 2007). P was the limiting factor
in terms of eutrophication control in winter in Lake Taihu (Xu et al.,
2010, 2013), this phenomenon was also found in Lake Horowhenua,
New Zealand (White et al., 1991). Thus, PCA found that P might be the
main factor affecting water quality of these special sites in the dry sea-
son. The most eastern part of Lake Wuli had the worst water quality
and this may be associated with more city wastewater discharge and
larger population size than the other areas. Thus, local governments
should prioritize further measures to manage and control pollution in
this area to avoid wider-scale pollution.
4. Conclusions
TLI and WQI methods were applied to assess the eutrophication
level and water quality status of the estuarine area of Lake Wuli in this
study. The results showed that the actual water situation showed dis-
tinct seasonal variation. The wet season was worse than the dry season
for both eutrophication levels and water quality status, in all three parts
of Lake Wuli. The average TLI and WQI values in the wet season were
61.69 and 60.70, and in the dry season they were 57.40 and 65.74, re-
spectively. Also, the actual water situation presented distinct spatial
variation, in both wet and dry seasons, East Wuli had the worst eutro-
phication levels and water quality status, followed by Middle Wuli
and West Wuli. Due to anthropogenic and topographic influences, the
most eastern part of Lake Wuli had the most serious water pollution.
Factor analysis from PCA indicated that N might be the main factor af-
fecting the water situation of the most eastern sites in the wet season,
and P may be the main factor in the dry season. The WQImin in our
study used three water parameters–DO, TN and CODMn–which had a
significant relationship with WQI, with even stricter standards than
WQI when analyzing water quality in the estuarine area of Lake Wuli.
This will provide a more beneficial and low-cost method for the evalu-
ation of the water quality of the study area in the future. Our results
are beneficial to assist government and management to make
evidence-based water ecological restoration decisions in the estuarine
area of Lake Wuli.
1401
Acknowledgements
The study was supported by Major Science and Technology Program
for Water Pollution Control and Treatment (2017ZX07203-005).
Appendix A. Supplementary data
Supplementary data to this article can be found online at https://doi.
org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.09.137.
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