Elevated Urbanization-Driven Plant Accumulation of Metal(loid)s Including Arsenic Species and Assessment of the Kłodnica River Sediment Contamination

Abstract

The impact of water and bottom sediment pollution of a river subjected to a strong industrial anthropogenic pressure of metal(loid) (including arsenic and its species) accumulation in riverbank plants such as Solidago virgaurea L., Phragmites L. and Urtica dioica L. was investigated. The high-performance liquid chromatography-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (HPLC-ICP-MS) technique was used to study organic and inorganic arsenic species in selected plants and their response to heavy metal and arsenic contamination. The modified BCR extraction results showed that arsenic was mainly bound to the mobile reducible and organic-sulfide fractions in the Kłodnica River bottom sediments. Research has shown that the bottom sediments of the Kłodnica River are contaminated with metals, including Pb, Zn, Ni, As, and among arsenic species, the As(V) form dominated quantitatively, with its highest concentration being 49.3 mg kg−1 and the organic species occurred extremely rarely. The highest concentration of arsenic, among the tested plants, occurred in Phragmites communis L. The evaluation of the bottom sediment pollution was performed using Sb/As factor, geoaccumulation index (Igeo), enrichment factor (EF) and pollution load index (PLI). The ability of the plant to assimilate metals from the substrate was studied by calculation of the bioaccumulation factor (BAF). Values of the Igeo change in a wide range from class 1 (uncontaminated to moderately polluted for Cu and Zn) at the first sampling point, to 5 (highly to extremely polluted for Ba and Fe) at the K4 sampling point. The Igeo results show an increase in the contamination with elements toward the runoff of the Kłodnica River.

Application of Multivariate Data Analysis to Sediments Data from the Kłodnica River (Upper Silesia, Poland)

“…These sources are heavily loaded with high concentrations of metals such as Cd, Pb and Zn in bottom sediments and river suspension. The chemometric interpretations of the collected data sets on the pollution of the Kłodnica river and its tributaries are confirmed by the results of the published research [1,9,20].…”

“…In the vicinity of energy sources many other branches of industry also appeared, e.g. metallurgical industry, power industry, engineering industry and chemical industry [9,20].…”

“…The spring of the Klodnica River is located in the southern part of Katowice, in Murckowski Forests. The river flows through the biggest cities of the Upper Silesia, such as: Katowice, Ruda Ślaska, Mikołow, Zabrze, Bytom, Gliwice and ends its course in Kedzierzyn-Kozle flowing into the Odra River [1,2,4,9]. In the Kłodnica catchment are located three dam reservoirs: Dzierżno Duże -on the Kłodnica river, Dzierżno Małe -on the Drama stream and Płaniowicki -on the Toszecki stream [21].…”

“…Especially in the upper course reaches of Kłodnica River and its tributaries spread over densely populated and industrial areas of Upper Silesian Industrial Region. This region is at the center of the strong investigation by many groups of researches from many years [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9]. The upper Kłodnica river flows through the densely populated industrial areas of the Upper Silesian Industrial District, collecting municipal and industrial sewage from Katowice, Ruda Śląska, Bytom, Zabrze and Gliwice.…”