Min­er­al waters of Tran­scarpathia

Zakarpat­tia is a unique region where almost all types of min­er­al waters that exist in Ukraine are wide­spread. Their heal­ing pow­er has been known far beyond its bor­ders since ancient times.

The Tran­scarpathi­an arte­sian basin con­sists of the Chop-Mukache­vo and Solotvyno basins, which are sep­a­rat­ed by the Vihor­lat-Hutyn ridge. The litho­log­i­cal and pet­ro­graph­ic com­po­si­tion of rocks most influ­ences the chem­i­cal com­po­si­tion of the min­er­al waters in this region. The devel­op­ment of salt deposits and relat­ed salt dome tec­ton­ics is par­tic­u­lar­ly sig­nif­i­cant.

The under­ground waters of this region con­tain var­i­ous microele­ments and their com­pounds. Boron, flu­o­ride, iron, arsenic, lithi­um, iodine-bromine, some­times hydro­gen sul­fide and oth­er types of water have been iden­ti­fied. How­ev­er, the most valu­able min­er­al waters in Zakarpat­tia are car­bon­at­ed waters.

Clas­si­fi­ca­tion of min­er­al waters (by Shestopalov V.M.): Min­er­al waters with­out spe­cif­ic com­po­nents are under­ground waters with a min­er­al­iza­tion lev­el of more than 1g/dm3, the effect of which on the human body occurs due to the com­po­si­tion of macro­com­po­nents in the water. Among the min­er­al waters with­out spe­cif­ic com­po­nents, chlo­ride-hydro­car­bon­ate (hydro­car­bon­ate-chlo­ride) and pre­dom­i­nant­ly sodi­um chlo­ride min­er­al waters from low-min­er­al­ized to salt are preva­lent in Zakarpat­tia. In the cen­tral zone of the Chop­sko-Mukachevskaya and Solotvin­skaya fold zones, water min­er­al­iza­tion ranges from 1–3 g/dm3, while waters with a min­er­al­iza­tion lev­el of 10 to 35 g/dm3 and chlo­ride sodi­um brines with a min­er­al­iza­tion lev­el of 300–500 g/dm3 asso­ci­at­ed with salt shafts are wide­spread in the Solotvin­skaya depres­sion.

Car­bon­at­ed min­er­al waters are typ­i­cal­ly asso­ci­at­ed with areas of intense­ly frac­tured rocks relat­ed to large tec­ton­ic faults. The most promis­ing waters in the Zakarpat­t­ian region are those found at depths rang­ing from 33 to 2050 m, with min­er­al­iza­tion lev­els rang­ing from 0.35 to 100 g/dm3. The most well-known deposits of car­bon­at­ed waters in this region are the Uzh­gorod (cold and ther­mal waters), Vyshkiv (ther­mal), Shayan­s’ke (cold), Bushchyn­s’ke (cold), Bere­hove (ther­mal), as well as sources in the area of Vely­ka Dobron, Chop, and with­in the Vyshkiv ore field. The most well-known resorts with car­bon­at­ed waters in Ukraine are “Polyana”, “Svalya­va”, “Karpaty”, “Soi­mi”, and “Shayan”.

Sul­fide min­er­al waters. The most favor­able struc­tures for the for­ma­tion of sul­fide waters are pre-moun­tain folds, plat­form basins, inter­moun­tain basins, and folds of ancient and young moun­tain­ous fold­ed areas. These struc­tures are often char­ac­ter­ized by the pres­ence of oil and gas deposits. In the Tran­scarpathi­an Basin, weak­ly sul­fide waters are devel­oped in some areas. The largest deposit of waters, “Synyak,” is locat­ed on the slopes of the Vyho­da-Gutin Range with­in the devel­op­ment of neo­gene vol­canic rocks. Most of the sources of sul­fide waters are locat­ed along the north­east­ern edge of the Solotvyno Basin.

Siliceous min­er­al waters are one of the most com­mon and valu­able min­er­al waters in Ukraine. Sil­i­ca (sil­i­con) is a spe­cif­ic com­po­nent of their com­po­si­tion, and the main source of sil­i­con is quartz and sil­i­cates.

Author: Mel­ny­chenko Mari­na