Potential Detection of Groundwater Using composite Analytical Hierarchy Process and Fuzzy Logic (Case Study: Varamin plain)

Increasing population in one side and water demands in other sides, the importance of groundwater resources as one of the most important fresh water resources, be more and more apparent. In this study, stream density, distance from drainage, slope, elevation, thickness of the aquifer, water table, rainfall, topography wetness index and the rate of permeability criteria were used to identify areas with potential of groundwater in Varamin plain. The Map of these criteria prepared and weighted using Analytical Hierarchy Process method, and with determination of the effective rate for each class and using fuzzy logic, prediction map of groundwater potential with two methods of AHP and fuzzy AHP were prepared and accuracy of the method was evaluated using wells with high discharge. The results showed that, due to hydro-geological complexity of the area, accuracy of fuzzy AHP and AHP was respectively 61 and 54 percent. Also, the areas with high potential were located in the northern half of the plains which covered with coarse sediment during the Quaternary. The results showed that application of fuzzy AHP method, besides saving time and money, had a good ability to predict the groundwater potential