Dental amalgam from dental clinics in Kosova is an uncontrolled source of mercury. The environmental legislative framework related to its use does not fully provide measures that reduce amalgam use and the release of its waste into the environment. This paper highlights issues related to environmental policy covering mercury amalgam waste management. Existing national regulations on hazardous waste management in Kosova consider the waste from dental health care as hazardous. Currently, however, no regulations restrict the use of dental amalgam or specifically oblige the generators of amalgam to treat or dispose of waste properly, thus leading to inconsistent legislation. New regulations, revised hazardous waste management standards, and new infrastructure for waste treatment and disposal, in compliance with EU regulations, should be developed to create a holistic approach that prevents the adverse effects of amalgam waste. Integr Environ Assess Manag 2021;17:1037–1044. © 2021 SETAC

The environment and its components have been severely contaminated over the years due to massive pollution. The multiple use of heavy metals in industrial, domestic, agricultural, medical and technological applications have led to their wide distribution in the environment. Different studies implied that the primary contribution to the ecological risk index, originated from various anthropogenic influences such as industrialization and urbanization. This has compromised the ability of the environment to foster life and render its intrinsic values due to the heavy usage of these elements. This research illustrates the assessment of heavy metals in waste, water, sludge and soil. Monitoring was performed in vicinity of a cement factory on the southern Kosovo, where the sampling and measurements were performed in the autumn season of 2018. With the use of atomic absorption spectroscopy technique (AAS), the elements determined in this study were Pb, Zn, Cu, Ni, Fe, Mn, and Al. The findings of this study revealed a little change in the concentrations of these elements in the environment samples, especially in water, apart from that there is slight pollution of the environment with heavy metals in this zone.

In order to evaluate the possible exploitation of thermal mineral water of Peja baths, for the health needs of the population, in the rehabilitation center, which was built near these waters, so far no appropriate scientific research is taken to evaluate them. The conceptual, professional, scientific and functional solution in this regard will results in the search for a new location destined for the next projections additional pools. This should be done in order to enable the population to use this natural wealth, for health and their commercial needs. Further research is planned to be conducted for the physico-chemical characterization, which will follow up on time to time the changes in the composition of the various components of this water. The analysis of the thermos-mineral water in this work involved the determination of several physico-chemical parameters (COD, BOD, conductivity, pH value, etc.) and some heavy metals (Cu, Mn, Fe, Pb, Cd, Zn, etc).

In this paper, as our main goal, we had the analysis of heavy metals in the water and sludge of wells, in residential areas, and the land near these wells, in the villages: Vrajak, Ratkoc and Rogovë, in the area of Rahovec. Also, the physic-chemical parameters have been our goal in the study, to make the assessment of the current situation, taking into account the climatic factors, at the time when we did the analysis. Groundwater was characterized with high solubility of salts (high or medium hardness), in contrast to surface waters, especially those at high altitudes, where the amount of magnesium and calcium salts, is smaller. Thus, it is very important to assess the quality of water in wells used as drinking water sources by people living in these villages in the municipality of Rahovec. Sampling was done in the monthly period (August/2018). By using inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectroscopy (ICP-AES), the concentrations of 10 elements were determined in: water, sludge and soil samples (As, Cd, Co, Cr, Cu, Fe, Mn, Ni, Pb and Zn).

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