Bionanomining: A Revised Insight into Processing of South Africa’s Complex Gold Ores

Okanigbe, Daniel Ogochukwu; Popoola, A. P. I.; Malatji, Nicholas; Lesufi, Tsietsi; Sekgobela, Gift

doi:10.1007/978-3-030-92662-5_19

Cited by 3 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…South Africa as a country is regarded as one of the richest countries with abundance of mineral resources such as gold, platinum, coal, cobalt and many more [1,2]. The exploration of gold started in the country in the 19th century [3], when the world largest gold deposit was discovered in the Witwatersrand Basin, South Africa [4]. The discovery of gold has contributed to the development of South Africa as one of the most developed and largest economy in the African continent [5].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Toxic Heavy Metals in Soil and Plants from a Gold Mining Area, South Africa

Raji¹,

Palamuleni²

2023

Heavy Metals - Recent Advances

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The mining of mineral deposits abundant in South Africa has led to the release of toxic heavy metals into the environment. The aim of this study was to investigate heavy metal pollution from a gold mining area. The concentrations of arsenic, cadmium, lead, and zinc were analyzed in soil and plants found within 500 m and 1000 m radius of a gold mine established in North-West. The concentrations of these heavy metals were determined using Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry. The results showed that the concentrations of the studied heavy metals were all below the national and international threshold but higher than the concentrations found several kilometers away from the mining area, the natural background concentration. The results from the pollution load index shows that the topsoil is contaminated for the selected heavy metals. There was accumulation of the studied heavy metals in the studied Eragrostis hypnoides plant’s leaves and roots. In this study, it was revealed that zinc and cadmium bioaccumulated in the plant via the soil. These findings suggests that the consumption of agricultural products from farms within the 1 km radius of the mining site could be detrimental to the wellbeing of direct and indirect consumers.

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