Contamination of groundwater by potential harmful elements from gold mine tailings and the implications to human health: A case study in Welkom and Virginia, Free State Province, South Africa

Belle, Gladys; Fossey, Annabel; Esterhuizen, Leana; Moodley, Roshila

doi:10.1016/j.gsd.2020.100507

Cited by 17 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 28 publications

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“…The reviewed articles were a collection from 12 African countries (Figure 2), with Nigeria recording the highest number of modified WQIs-Tanzania, Mozambique, Libya, Chad, Tunisia, and Namibia, with the least. The CCMEWQI was adapted by eight articles, including [39][40][41][42][43]71,77], whereas the WAWQI was adapted by 34 articles, including [49,50,62,67,[78][79][80][81][82]. The three developmental steps used by the articles that adapted CCMEWQI were the Scope (F1), Frequency (F2), and Amplitude (F3) calculations.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Among the new models are the Equitable raw water pricing model [12], UWQI for South African river catchments [65], and Surrogate WQI for South African watersheds [66]. In addition, similar to other African regional blocs, the fitness of both surface and groundwater has been assessed for drinking and domestic purposes using both WAWQI [67][68][69][70][71] and CCME WQI [72], respectively.…”

Section: Application Of Wqis: the African Perspectivementioning

confidence: 99%

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Adapted Water Quality Indices: Limitations and Potential for Water Quality Monitoring in Africa

Lukhabi

Mensah

Asare

et al. 2023

Water

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A Water Quality Index (WQI) is a tool that describes the overall water quality by combining complex and technical water quality information into a single meaningful unitless numerical value. WQIs predict water quality since they reflect the impact of multiple Water Quality Parameters (WQPs) and allow for spatial-temporal comparison of water quality status. Most African countries employ adapted WQIs by modifying the original index (or indices) and propose their concepts for evaluating the quality of surface and groundwater, which is normally accompanied by irregularities. The current review examined the process(es) involved in WQI modifications for monitoring water quality in Africa, explored associated limitations, and suggested areas for improvement. A review of 42 research articles from five databases in the last ten years (2012–2022) was conducted. The findings indicated Weighted Arithmetic (WAWQI) and the Canadian Council of Ministers of Environment (CCMEWQI) as the most adapted WQIs. However, several limitations were encountered in WQI developmental steps, mainly in parameter selection and classification schemes used for the final index value. Incorporation of biological parameters, use of less subjective statistical methods in parameter selection, and logical linguistic descriptions in classification schemes were some recommendations for remedying the limitations to register the full potential of adapted WQIs for water quality monitoring in Africa.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Application Of Wqis: the African Perspectivementioning

confidence: 99%

Adapted Water Quality Indices: Limitations and Potential for Water Quality Monitoring in Africa

Lukhabi

Mensah

Asare

et al. 2023

Water

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“…Belle et al also found that gold mining in the Welkom and Virginia regions of the Free State Province of South Africa has generated large amounts of gold mine tailings, which contain various contaminants. These pollutants cause groundwater contamination with the dominant toxic metals, namely Fe and Pb (Belle et al, 2021). Several studies have been conducted to overcome heavy metal pollution in general industrial wastewater and the mining industry.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Adsorption of Iron and Manganese Ions from Mine Acid Water Using Manganese Green Sand in Batch Process

Kusdarini,

Sania,

Budianto

2023

J. Ecol. Eng.

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Fe and Mn metal ions in acid mine drainage can contaminate water bodies and soil, endangering human health. In this study, the adsorption of Fe and Mn in acid mine drainage was carried out using manganese greensand. This study aimed to obtain 1) the adsorption model of Fe and Mn isotherms using manganese greensand and 2) the surface morphology of manganese greensand before and after the adsorption process. This study used laboratoryscale experimental methods with variable concentrations of Fe (325, 400, 475, 550, 625 mg/L) and Mn (432, 507, 582, 657, 732 mg/L). The Freundlich and Langmuir adsorption isotherm models were used to determine the adsorption capacity of Fe and Mn by manganese greensand. Test for Fe and Mn content using the AAS method and test the surface morphology and content of manganese greensand using SEM-EDX. The results showed that:(1) the Freundlich equation test yielded for Fe: in a constant R 2 of 0.9862, n = 0.6912, KB = 0.2180 mg/g, while the Langmuir equation test yielded in a constant R 2 of 0.8836, b = 0.0051 L/mg, q m = 169.4915 mg/g; the Freundlich equation test yielded for Mn: in a constant R 2 of 0.9923, n = 0.8651, KB = 1.0445 mg/g, while the Langmuir equation test yielded in a constant R 2 of 0.6615, b = 0.0010 L/mg, q m = 500 mg/g; (2) The surface morphology of manganese greensand before contact with acid mine drainage contains needle-shaped particles of uniform size with a hexagonal structure, whereas, after contact with acid mine drainage, the particles are clumped like cotton and form needles with varying sizes.

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“…Similarly, there are a large number of gold mine tailings in the Welkom and Virginia areas of the Free State Province in South Africa. According to the World Health Organization and the South African National Drinking Water Standard, an analysis of the groundwater quality in the target area found that 40% of the analyzed samples contained lead exceeding the drinking water quality standard limit, 63% contained iron exceeding the standard limit, 100% contained faecal coliform bacterial counts noncompliant with the current guidelines, and 50% contained E. coli counts exceeding the standard limit [4]. Because groundwater is the main source of drinking water for the local population, this pollution poses a serious threat to their health.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Progress, Challenges, and Perspectives of Bioleaching for Recovering Heavy Metals from Mine Tailings

Gao¹,

Jiang

Mao

et al. 2021

Adsorption Science & Technology

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The accumulation of mine tailings on Earth is a serious environmental challenge. The importance for the recovery of heavy metals, together with the economic benefits of precious and base metals, is a strong incentive to develop sustainable methods to recover metals from tailings. Currently, researchers are attempting to improve the efficiency of metal recovery from tailings using bioleaching, a more sustainable method compared to traditional methods. In this work, the research status of using biological leaching technologies to recover heavy metals from tailings was reviewed. Furthermore, CiteSpace 5.7.R2 was used to visually analyze the keywords of relevant studies on biological leaching of tailings to intuitively establish the current research hotspots. We found that current research has made recent progress on influencing factors and microbial genetic data, and innovations have also been made regarding the improvement of the rate of metal leaching by biological leaching combined with other technologies. This is of great significance for the development of bioleaching technologies and industrial production of heavy metals in tailings. Finally, challenges and opportunities for bioleaching provide directions for further research by the scientific community.

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Contamination of groundwater by potential harmful elements from gold mine tailings and the implications to human health: A case study in Welkom and Virginia, Free State Province, South Africa

Cited by 17 publications

References 28 publications

Adapted Water Quality Indices: Limitations and Potential for Water Quality Monitoring in Africa

Adapted Water Quality Indices: Limitations and Potential for Water Quality Monitoring in Africa

Adsorption of Iron and Manganese Ions from Mine Acid Water Using Manganese Green Sand in Batch Process

Progress, Challenges, and Perspectives of Bioleaching for Recovering Heavy Metals from Mine Tailings

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