Heavy-Metal Distribution in River Waters and Sediments around a “Firefly Village”, Shikoku, Japan: Application of Multivariate Analysis

Abstract

River water and sediment samples were collected at the same site in a vicinity of an abandoned mine, and the concentrations of major elements and heavy metals were determined. The chemical correlations were observed by principal component analysis (PCA), and the samples were classified by cluster analysis (CA) based on the PCA scores. The PCA results presented a macroscopic viewpoint of covariance structure, i.e., the chemical elements could be classified into three groups: 1) major elements and heavy metals in the river water, 2) Cd, Fe and Mn in the sediments, and 3) Cu and Zn in the sediments. The CA results implied a similarity of chemical compositions in most parts of the study area, except the ranges close to the abandoned copper mine. At the mixing location of mining water with natural river water, major elements and cadmium showed simple physical mixing (conservative mixing). Other heavy metals (Cu, Fe, Mn and Zn) showed the massive precipitation at the mixing event. The PCA structure was mainly interpreted in terms of the mixing process between mining water and diluted natural river water.

Preliminary Physical Chemical Characterization of River Waters and Sediments Affected by Copper Mining Activity in Central Chile: Application of Multivariate Analysis

“…In addition, data standardization of each variable was done prior to statistical analysis because the concentration orders among the elements and the parameters differed greatly and statistical results would be highly biased by elements with high concentration. 8 CA was performed from the original data in order to reduce the variant biases. The Furthest Neighbor method was applied for grouping of the different variables, and dissimilarity was defined by City-Block distance.…”

“…[5][6][7][8][9][10] Therefore, in order to understand the environmental behavior of elements including pollutants and taking into account that sediments are in continuous interaction with the liquid phase, it is more convenient to combine both water and sediment analysis. [8][9][10] Chile has experienced a dramatic increase in its mining activities in the past few years, bringing about investments and technological changes. Some of these changes, however, have had damaging effects on the environment.…”

Metal Distribution at River Water of Mining and Nickel Industrial Area in Pomalaa Southeast Sulawesi Province, Indonesia

“…The level of Cu content in the Huko-huko river and in the Oko-oko river reaches up to 0.0086 mg/l and 0.0085 mg/l respectively. Copper (Cu) is a heavy metal that can be found in aquatic environments as well as in the sediments 32 . Cu belongs to the group of essential metals, at which in the low levels it needs of the organism as a coenzyme in the metabolism of the body, the new toxic nature appears in high levels 33 .…”

The Relations Between Concentration of Iron and the pH Ground Water (Case Study Zulfi Ground Water)

“…Ground water is an important source of drinking water for humankind. The water pollution by heavy metals has become a question of considerable public and scientific concern in the light of the evidence of their toxicity to human health and biological systems (Anazawa et al, 2004). Heavy metals receive particular concern considering their strong toxicity even at low concentrations (Marcovecchio et al, 2007).…”