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Toxics
Special Issues
Assessment of Metal and Trace Element Contamination in Soil
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Assessment of Metal and Trace Element Contamination in Soil

A special issue of Toxics (ISSN 2305-6304). This special issue belongs to the section "Metals and Radioactive Substances".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 June 2022) | Viewed by 7991

Special Issue Editor

Dr. Manfred Sager

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Bio Forschung Austria, 1220 Vienna, Austria
Interests: trace elements (heavy metals, platinum metals, rare earths); phosphorus; iodine—occurrence and analysis; environmental mobility and speciation
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Since the bronze age, metal smelting and refining have caused contamination in soil, which must be differentiated from geogenically occurring ore veins and outcrops. Industrialization has sped up these processes, including global transport of contaminants via dust and water.

In this Special Issue, we intend to provide an update about metal and trace element contamination in soil. Progress in multi-element analysis facilitating findings of interelement relationships, phase analysis, microlocal analysis, and field methods is continuously widening this scope.

Contributions covering all elements except typical non-metals are welcome. These should include:

(1) Environmental monitoring to detect sources of locally enhanced contamination levels, including digestion and determination methods in liquid and solid;

(2) Characterization of defined metal sources, such as ore formation, mining and smelting, soil excavations from metalliferous areas, waste deposits, sewage and manure, fertilizers, traffic, and atmospheric inputs;

(3) Environmental mobilities, such as migration in the soil column, leaching to groundwater and erosion, mobile fractions, and dissolution kinetics;

(4) Transfer to plants and crops, including pot and field experiments to monitor soil-to-plant transfer, in combination with mobile soil fractions, changes of soil microbiology because of contamination, metalliferous vegetation, and accumulation in plants;

(5) Sanitation and recovery strategies, such as stabilization procedures, soil washing, phytoextraction, and metal recovery from metalliferous plants and waste;

(6) Setting of thresholds based on risk assessment to enable authorities to take legal action.

Dr. Manfred Sager
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Toxics is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • inorganic soil composition and pollution
  • trace element speciation and mobility
  • soil pollution sources
  • pollution impacts on soil life and plant growth
  • soil restoration and metal recovery
  • soil risk assessment

Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

13 pages, 1353 KiB  
Article
Identification of Metal Contamination Sources and Evaluation of the Anthropogenic Effects in Soils near Traffic-Related Facilities
by Hong-gil Lee, Yoon Joo Byun, Young-Woo Chun, Hoe-Jung Noh, Dong-Jin Kim, Hyun-Koo Kim and Ji-In Kim
Toxics 2021, 9(11), 278; https://doi.org/10.3390/toxics9110278 - 21 Oct 2021
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 1718
Abstract
Traffic-related facilities typically have much lower metal emissions than other sources; however, they can be numerous and widespread as well. Subdividing pollution sources is necessary to assess soil contamination characteristics and identify sources according to the contamination cause. Anthropogenic contamination by metals was [...] Read more.
Traffic-related facilities typically have much lower metal emissions than other sources; however, they can be numerous and widespread as well. Subdividing pollution sources is necessary to assess soil contamination characteristics and identify sources according to the contamination cause. Anthropogenic contamination by metals was quantitatively determined using contamination factor (Cf) and evaluated using multivariate analysis. More than half of the concentrations for Zn, Pb, and Cu in soils were higher than that in the natural background (NB). Cf of metals was, in decreasing order, Zn > Pb = Cu > Ni = As. Zn, Pb, and Cu were identified as anthropogenic contaminants in correlation analysis. Principal component analysis showed that the two main contamination causes were coarse particles from the maintenance or crushing activities of vehicles and nonexhaust/exhaust emissions. Clusters were classified according to those two anthropogenic and lithogenic causes and included Group I (Zn, Pb, and Cu in garages, auto repair shops, and auto salvage yards), Group II (Zn, Pb, and Cu in parking lots, driving schools, and roadsides), and Group III (As and Ni with high lithogenic properties). Anthropogenic input and sources of soil contamination by metals in traffic-related facilities were appropriately estimated through the combination of Cf and multivariate analysis. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Assessment of Metal and Trace Element Contamination in Soil)
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14 pages, 2105 KiB  
Article
Solid-Phase Partitioning and Leaching Behavior of Pb and Zn from Playground Soils in Kabwe, Zambia
by Walubita Mufalo, Pawit Tangviroon, Toshifumi Igarashi, Mayumi Ito, Tsutomu Sato, Meki Chirwa, Imasiku Nyambe, Hokuto Nakata, Shouta Nakayama and Mayumi Ishizuka
Toxics 2021, 9(10), 248; https://doi.org/10.3390/toxics9100248 - 4 Oct 2021
Cited by 9 | Viewed by 2706
Abstract
Zambia’s Kabwe mine wastes (KMWs) are responsible for contaminating the surrounding soil and dust in the Kabwe district. Unfortunately, these wastes arise from the historical mining activities of lead (Pb) and Zinc (Zn), which lacked adequate waste management strategies. As a result, potentially [...] Read more.
Zambia’s Kabwe mine wastes (KMWs) are responsible for contaminating the surrounding soil and dust in the Kabwe district. Unfortunately, these wastes arise from the historical mining activities of lead (Pb) and Zinc (Zn), which lacked adequate waste management strategies. As a result, potentially toxic elements (PTEs) (Pb and Zn) spread across the Kabwe district. To assess the soil pollution derived from previous mining activities, we studied topsoil samples (n = 8) from the school playground soils (SPs). In this study, the degree of contamination, geochemical partitioning, and leachability, coupled with the release and retention of Pb and Zn, were studied. The SPs were classified as extremely enriched (EF > 40) and contaminated with Pb (Igeo > 5). On average, Pb (up to 89%) and Zn (up to 69%) were bound with exchangeable, weak acid-soluble, reducible and oxidizable phases, which are considered as ’geochemically mobile’ phases in the environment. The leachates from the soils (n = 5) exceeded the Zambian standard (ZS: 190:2010) for Pb in potable drinking water (Pb < 0.01 mg/L). Furthermore, the spatial distribution of Pb and Zn showed a significant reduction in contents of Pb and Zn with the distance from the mine area. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Assessment of Metal and Trace Element Contamination in Soil)
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19 pages, 23440 KiB  
Article
Conditions Affecting the Release of Heavy and Rare Earth Metals from the Mine Tailings Kola Subarctic
by Eugenia Krasavtseva, Victoria Maksimova and Dmitry Makarov
Toxics 2021, 9(7), 163; https://doi.org/10.3390/toxics9070163 - 9 Jul 2021
Cited by 15 | Viewed by 2684
Abstract
In the Kola Subarctic, a mining industry has developed, which is a source of environmental pollution with heavy metals. The objects of study were the tailings of three large mining enterprises in the region: apatite-nepheline, complex and loparite ores. The geotechnical characteristics were [...] Read more.
In the Kola Subarctic, a mining industry has developed, which is a source of environmental pollution with heavy metals. The objects of study were the tailings of three large mining enterprises in the region: apatite-nepheline, complex and loparite ores. The geotechnical characteristics were studied, and the granulometric composition of the samples was established. The main minerals that make up the material of ore dressing tailings have been determined. Using inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry, the content of trace elements, in particular heavy metals and rare earth elements, has been established. The enrichment factor, the geoaccumulation indexes, the potential ecological risk index factor and the potential environmental hazard index have been calculated. Priority pollutants characteristics for specific objects have been identified. It is noted that the finely dispersed material of the tailings of loparite and complex ores is 1.5–3 times enriched in heavy and rare earth metals in comparison with the total material of the tailings. In laboratory conditions, experiments were carried out to simulate the process of interaction of dust particles with soil solutions containing different amounts of dissolved organic matter and at average seasonal temperatures. It was found that a decrease in the pH of the solution and an increase in the amount of organic carbon and temperature lead to the mobilization of heavy and rare earth metals from the tailings. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Assessment of Metal and Trace Element Contamination in Soil)
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