Análise da qualidade ambiental do Rio Potengi como instrumento de educação ambiental

Abstract

The Potengi River presents high socio-environmental impacts and conflicts, in which the lack of policies, studies and mitigating actions contribute negatively to this scenario. The study of rivers with the involvement of local actors is an important mechanism to integrate and expand different knowledge and environmental perceptions, helping to understand the anthropic processes. It was in this sense that the aim was to carry out the environmental characterization of the Potengi River, in urban and rural stretches located in the city of São Paulo do Potengi/RN, under the vision of high school students of a public school, as a didacticpedagogical instrument of Environmental Education. For this, multitemporal land use and land mapping was carried out using LANDSAT satellites 3, 5 and 8, followed by field visits in the rainy and dry periods of 2018. In these field activities, based on the Branco method (2004), students completed visual water quality assessment sheets and identified potentially degrading actions. Subsequently, with the data of the water mapping and evaluation, this information was interpreted together with the students, using Bayesian inference. The study found a reduction in the density of ciliary forest, mainly in urban areas (P2 - Campo Grande dam and P3 - Juremal), caused by expansion without planning and causing negative effects on the environmental, social and economic areas. As for the water quality, P3 was more negatively evaluated. In the urban stretches, the inland discharge of domestic and commercial sewage, irregular use and occupation of the soil, water supply for animals, silting, fishing and suppression of the riparian forest were verified. In rural areas, there were agricultural activities, livestock raising, silting and also vegetation reduction. In view of the above, these practices enabled students to identify degrading actions and increase their knowledge, as well as strengthen their relationships with the river and produce reflections on current socioenvironmental conditions, acting as a contextualized process of environmental education.