You can prepare GW potential map by using ArcGIS sofware or using Arcview software by using WIOA (weighted Index overlay analysis) method. In this you have to give weightage & rank for each criteria refer journals in website, you get an idea.

It is simple question of logic of groundwater hydrology. When you have map all these factors (parameters) you might be knowing which level of a factor is more important and which less important for groundwater potential. For example, areas having highest aquifer permeability are more likely to have water than areas which have least permeability. In this way you can rank areas or polygons of a parameter in ascending and descending order. On overlaying you may add these ranks for sub-polygons. For example a polygon has the most favourable rank of 8 of a parameter but some part of it coincides with part of a parameter having a moderate potential of 3 and some part of it coincides with the part of that parameter having lowest potential of 1, then the sum of ranks of the two layers in the first case will be 11 while in the other case it will be 9. Keep it mind the highest rank of any layer will be number of polygons demarcated according to the values of parameter. When ranks of all parameters at sub-polygon levels are summed up, obviously, as explained the polygon having the highest some has the highest probability of groundwater potential and vice versa.

Yes Francis, you are capable of using map algebra to determine Fuzzy membership.

You use GIS software and find out different layers of GW potential map. weigh these factors for over all generation factors.

The British Geological Survey recently did a similar map for Africa, using similar source data. Perhaps you check which Methodology they used.

http://www.bgs.ac.uk/research/groundwater/international/africangroundwater/maps.html

It is worth questioning whether lineaments actually increase permeability in the area that you are study. I found that in some areas lineaments are actually lower permeability barriers to groundwater flow... see the paper in GSA Bulletin... http://civil-staff.mcgill.ca/gleeson/publications/Gleeson&Novakowski2009.pdf

Use GIS softwares and see relevant journals

Its is important to see the suitability of particular tool and techniques for analysis.

weigh of particular layers can vary as per terrain condition , you have to select the parameters which are best suitable for your study and compute in statistical analysis tools of GIS software.

Best way to make a ground water potential map is doing the groundcheck and integration with all available data.

There is no definite thumb rule for assigning weightage to factors for generation of a ground water potential map. It all depends on the terrain and the area we are talking about. For hard rock area having fractured and fissured aquifer the weightage will be more on the geology, depth of weathering, lineaments, drainage, geomorphology, precipitation, soil seepage, land slope etc. For alluvial areas, the weightage will be more on geomorphology, geology, drainage and relief. Best way to approach is to collect some available historical data of that area, then put them up on your thematic layers to find whic gives you the best weightage. After doing all these, when you finally come up with your poptential map, again go back to your historical data and see if your potential map is able to reproduce the same result shown by your historical data. If Historical data of that particular area is not available, try to seek perspective from similar areas, where data is available and put that perspective in your map generation. End of the day it all comes down to ground truthing by drill testing of the same

I have done several research on the GW potential all the articles are uploaded in RG You can refer them to get a solution for your problem

Kindly check the following. There is an explanation for rating assignment. Also you could go for Analytical Hierarchical Process.

Index-based groundwater vulnerability mapping models using hydrogeological settings: A critical evaluation

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0195925515000037

Dear Francis

You can weight different effective factors on groundwater potential by using different models such as Shannon's Entropy model. Please see two of my papers as attached.

By the way, by my experience, altitude, distance from fault, and fault density has the highest importance in groundwater potential mapping.

Best Regards.

Article Groundwater qanat potential mapping using frequency ratio an...

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The following method can be followed:

Multi-Criteria Evaluation (MCE)

Assigning weights/modeling - To determine the inter-class/ inter- map dependency, a probability-weighted approach using Bayesian statistics may be adopted for a linear combination of probability weights (W) of each thematic layer with the individual capability value (CV).

The different kinds of derived thematic layers have to be ranked in a scale of 0 to 5, based on relative contribution of each layer.  The rank of each layer has to be converted to a probability weight (Wi = Ri ∕ ∑Ri).  The different features/categories of each thematic layer have also to be assigned scores in a numeric scale of 0 to 5. The assigned scores of different features/categories for each layer have to be converted to capability values (CVi = ri  ∕ ∑ri). These capability values (CVi) have to be multiplied with the respective probability weight of each thematic layer. An aggregation of these product values leads to the resultant weight map i.e. groundwater potential zones.

Ri = rank of a layer, ∑Ri = total rank value of layers (considered for modeling),  ri = Rank of a particular feature/category in a layer, ∑ ri  = total rank value of the features/categories of a theme/layer. 

Mathematically, this can be defined as (e.g. with some thematic layers)

Gw = f (Dr, Geom, Lin, Litho, Sl, Lu), 

Where, Gw = Groundwater, Dr = Drainage, Geom = Geomorphology, Lin = Lineament, Lith = Lithology, Sl = Slope, Lu = Landuse

Groundwater potential map (GWP) can be expressed as

GWP = Σ Wi * CVi

where, GWP = Groundwater Potential, Wi = Map weight, CVi = Individual capability value.

The resultant final weight map will indicate the potentiality of groundwater occurrence in the study area. This map then may be classified into different categories of potentiality namely, Excellent, Very Good, Good, Poor etc.

Of course, the findings have to  be validated by some ground-truth data.

Please give your feedback.