Copper contamination in the Patuxent River, Maryland

Abstract

Copper contamination was studied in the Patuxent River, Maryland, which flows from the western shore of the Chesapeake Bay. The only heavy industry on this river is a coal-fired power plant situated 35 km from the river mouth. The plant uses river water for cooling purposes and had been implicated in early studies as a source of localized copper pollution from copper: nickel condenser tubing. Average cooling water usage exceeded average natural river flow over the study period by a factor of 3.

Dissent in the sediment? Lake sediments as archives of short- and long-range impact of anthropogenic activities in northeastern Germany

“…The warm waste water, however, was expelled into lake ST (UBA 2004 ) leading to an increase in average water temperature (O’Reilly et al 2015 ). Presumably, the water could have carried Cu from the external cooling system through which it was transferred, as was observed in other power plant effluents (Wright and Zamudal 1991 ; Friedlander et al 1996 ; Bojakowska and Krasuska 2014 ).…”

Lipid metabolism in the moss Dicranum scoparium: effect of light conditions and heavy metals on the accumulation of acetylenic triacylglycerols

“…In order to perturb metabolism in a different way to the light‐induced changes, we exposed D. scoparium to concentrations of heavy metals, which were environmentally realistic (see Puckett and Burton 1981, Wright and Zamuda 1991). 10 µ M Pb 2+ exposure for 24 h resulted in a significant decrease of total lipid labelling and in that of the neutral lipid fraction (Table 6).…”

Use of oysters as indicators of copper contamination in the Patuxent River, Maryland

“…The concentration of dissolved and particulate copper recorded for the Patuxent River estuary (Wright & Zamuda, 1990) appears to be reflected in oyster tissue-copper concentrations for oysters harvested from this estuary . For example, maximum environmental copper levels were recorded in the region of the Chalk Point Plant along with maximum oyster copper levels within the Patuxent River estuary .…”

“…The Abbe and Sanders (1986) study was confined to the immediate vicinity of Chalk Point, whereas the current study was extended from Holland Cliff (River Km 45) to Solomons, 3 km from the river mouth . Data describing dissolved and particulate copper concentrations in Patuxent River water have been described in a companion paper (Wright & Zamuda, 1990), which creates a budget for copper input to the river . In the current paper, we describe the bioavailable copper in the Patuxent River as defined by body burdens in * Contribution No .…”