Contamination of soil, medicinal, and fodder plants with lead and cadmium present in mine-affected areas, Northern Pakistan

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate the lead (Pb) and cadmium (Cd) concentrations in the soil and plants (medicinal and fodder) grown in chromite mining-affected areas, Northern Pakistan. Soil and plant samples were collected and analyzed for Pb and Cd concentrations using atomic absorption spectrometer. Soil pollution load indices (PLIs) were greater than 2 for both Cd and Pb, indicating high level of contamination in the study area. Furthermore, Cd concentrations in the soil surrounding the mining sites exceeded the maximum allowable limit (MAL) (0.6 mg kg(-1)), while the concentrations of Pb were lower than the MAL (350 mg kg(-1)) set by State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA) for agriculture soil. The concentrations of Cd and Pb were significantly higher (P < 0.001) in the soil of the mining-contaminated sites as compared to the reference site, which can be attributed to the dispersion of toxic heavy metals, present in the bed rocks and waste of the mines. The concentrations of Pb and Cd in majority of medicinal and fodder plant species grown in surrounding areas of mines were higher than their MALs set by World Health Organization/Food Agriculture Organization (WHO/FAO) for herbal (10 and 0.3 mg kg(-1), respectively) and edible (0.3 and 0.2 mg kg(-1), respectively) plants. The high concentrations of Cd and Pb may cause contamination of the food chain and health risk.

Screening for Autochthonous Phytoextractors in a Heavy Metal Contaminated Coal Mining Area

“…Et Kit. was reported having certain ability to extract HM from contaminated soil in previous research [ 54 ]. Its AG content, BCF and TF of Cd were 3.33 ± 0.55 mg·kg −1 , 0.69 and 1.25 in the soil with Cd concentration of 4.76 ± 1.2 mg·kg −1 at a mine-affect area, which did not meet the requirement for phytoextractor due to the low BCF.…”

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in the soil profiles (0–100 cm) from the industrial district of a large open-pit coal mine, China

“…21 Mining-impacted soils and industrially impacted soils are among the poorly structured soils and generally abundant with a toxic substance such as PAHs. 22 Research on the PAHs in soil inuenced by the sole factor of mining activity or industrial activity is abundant. However, soils affected by these two different activities were generally separately researched.…”

Contamination Level, Source Identification and Health Risk Assessment of Potentially Toxic Elements in Drinking Water Sources of Mining and Non-mining Areas of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan

“…In addition, numerous studies showed high PTEs concentrations in the surrounding mining areas and ore deposits as well as in terrestrial ecosystems (Rashed 2010). and groundwater variables were influenced by the common geogenic or anthropogenic sources in the study area, that could be resulted from mafic and ultramafic rocks deposits and mining wastes, releasing high levels of PTEs to the environment (Nawab et al 2015), as well as open dumping and mobilization of mining wastes in abandoned mines, and tailing ponds could be another reason, lead to contaminate the surrounding local soils, surface rivers water and groundwater with PTEs (Shen et al 2019). The results of these correlation analysis of major ions in present study showed similarity with the previous studies, conducted by and Santana et al (2020).…”