Environmental and Health Risk Assessment Due to Potentially Toxic Elements in Soil near Former Antimony Mine in Western Serbia

Abstract

Background: Anthropogenic activities have clearly affected the environment, with irreversible and destructive consequences. Mining activities have a significant negative impact, primarily on soil, and then on human health. The negative impact of the first mining activities is represented even today in the soils of those localities. Research shows that, for different types of mines, the concentrations of potentially toxic elements (PTEs) are high, especially in antimony, multi-metal and lead–zinc mines, which have adverse effects on the environment and then on human health and the economy. A large flood in 2014 in Western Serbia resulted in the breaking of the dam of the processed antimony ore dump of the former antimony mine, causing toxic tailings to spill and pollute the downstream area. Due to this accident, tailings material flooded the area downstream of the dump, and severely affected the local agriculture and population. Methods: Potentially toxic elements content, pollution indices and health indices were determined in soil samples from the flooded area, using referenced methodologies. The sources and routes of pollutants and risks were determined and quantified using statistical principal component analysis, positive matrix factorisation, and a Monte Carlo simulation. Results: The main source of As, Cd, Hg, Pb, Sb and Zn in the upper part of the study area was the tailing material. Based on the pollution indices, about 72% of the studied samples show a high risk of contamination and are mainly distributed immediately downstream of the tailings dump that was spilled due to heavy rainfall. Conclusions: Although the content of the PTEs is high, there is no non-carcinogenic risk for any PTEs except As, for which a threshold risk was determined. There is no carcinogenic risk in the study area.

Distribution, Risk Assessment and Source Identification of Potentially Toxic Elements in Coal Mining Contaminated Soils of Makarwal, Pakistan: Environmental and Human Health Outcomes

“…The main functions of this index are to indicate the contaminants where contamination studies should be prioritized. Ecological risk index (ERI) is the critical measure of soil contamination and risk factor and is calculated through Equation (4).…”

“…Coal is the main source of energy and has been thought of as the economic backbone of the country for a long time. However, the coalmine's health and environmental consequences must not be overlooked [1][2][3][4]. Up to 76 of the 92 elements are found naturally in coal.…”

Health Risk Assessment due to Some Potentially Toxic Elements in Sepiolite Mineral

“…Today, various chemical, biological, and physical pollutants arising as a result of rapid population growth, industrialization, and excessive mining activities have become a major problem that adversely affects people, animals, plants, organisms, and ecosystems all over the world (Abbaslou & Bakhtiari, 2017;Tyagi et al, 2022;Kolawole et al, 2023). Contamination of agricultural soils, water resources, and food crops with potentially toxic elements (PTEs) as chemical pollutants remains a major environmental issue at the global due to their persistence in the environment, their tendency to bioaccumulate in the food chain, and their toxicity to humans, animals and plants (Rinklebe et al, 2019;Liu et al, 2020;Pham et al, 2022;Belanović et al, 2023;Agbasi et al, 2023). The main sources of PTEs are human activities such as chemical and metallurgical industries, mining, agriculture, combustion from vehicle emissions, power plants, and coal burning, etc.…”

Types and Source Apportionment of Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs) in Soil-Groundwater of a Closed Coking Plant in Shanxi Province, China

“…Therefore, pollution level investigation, pollution source identification, and health risk assessment are necessary before such sites' secondary development and utilization. Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are widely regarded as one of the major pollutants that reflect the soil-groundwater quality in coking sites and have been used as a regular test item for risk assessment and environmental monitoring [5,6].…”

“…PAHs consist of two or more condensed aromatic rings, which are essential persistent organic pollutants discharged in the long-term process of the coking industry [7]. PAHs are widely concerned because of their carcinogenicity, teratogenicity, and mutagenicity, and 16 of them are listed as priority environmental pollutants by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) and "Environmental Priority Pollutant Blacklist of China" [5,[8][9][10]. The generation of PAHs in soil-groundwater can be mainly divided into natural activities and human activities [11,12].…”