Estimation of Risk to the Eco-Environment and Human Health of Using Heavy Metals in the Uttarakhand Himalaya, India

Abstract

In the modern era, due to the rapid increase in urbanization and industrialization in the vicinity of the Himalayas, heavy metals contamination in soil has become a key priority for researchers working globally; however, evaluation of the human and ecological risks mainly in hilly areas remains limited. In this study, we analyzed indices like the contamination factor (CF), degree of contamination (DC), enrichment factor (EF), geochemical index (Igeo), pollution ecological risk index (PERI), and pollution load index (PLI), along with cancer risk (CR) and hazard indices (HI), to ascertain the eco-environmental and human risks of using heavy metals in datasets collected from 168 sampling locations in Uttarakhand, India. The evaluation calculated of Igeo, EF, and CF suggests that represented soil samples were moderately contaminated and highly augmented with Rb, while PERI (75.56) advocates a low ecological risk. Further, PLI and DC (PLI: 1.26; DC: 36.66) show a possible health risk for the native population in the vicinity of the studied catchment. The hazard index (HI) is estimated greater than 1 (HI > 1) for Cr and Mn, representing a possible risk for cancer. However, adults are free from cancer risk, and other studied elements have been reported as noncarcinogenic. This assessment gives important information to policymakers, environmentalists, and foresters for taking mitigation measures in advance to mitigate the potential future risk of soil pollution on humans, ecology, and the environment.

Assessment of heavy metals contamination and associated risks in shallow groundwater sources from three different residential areas within Ibadan metropolis, southwest Nigeria

“…Several pollution indices can be employed to assess the degree to which trace elements contaminate water resources (Devanesan et al 2017;Rahman et al 2020;Kumar et al 2020b). The integrated index method is used in the present study to evaluate heavy metal contamination in groundwater.…”

“…, ED is the exposure duration time (70 years as adult ED, while 10 years = child ED) (Kumar et al 2020b), BW (in kg) denotes the mean body weight (equivalent to 5 kg, 10 kg, and 60 kg for infant, child, and adult, respectively), and AT (the averaging time in days) (equals 3650 days and 25,550 days for child and adult, respectively). Using AT = EF × ED, Eq.…”

“…Toxicity of HMs can be introduced into the body through inhalation, dermal contact, and ingestion (Olujimi et al 2014;Ayedun et al 2015;Ogundele et al 2019;Kumar et al 2020b). It should be noted that only a small number of HMs (in very small quantities) are considered important for different biochemical reactions in the human body (Singh et al 2011;Selvam et al 2017;Shankar 2019;Kumar et al 2020a, b, c).…”

“…and Egbueri 2019;Egbueri 2020). The final value for the non-carcinogenic risk evaluation is the hazard index (HI)(Egbueri and Mgbenu 2020;Kumar et al 2020b). It assists in determination of the total effects of all dissolved HMs (Egbueri and Mgbenu 2020) in analyzed water.…”

Heavy Metals and Microbial Activity in Alluvial Soils Affected by Different Land-Uses

“…Transformation factor (TF) is one of the main components which calculates the differences in bio-availability of heavy metals to plants from the soil rhizosphere, and to identify the efficacy of the plant to cumulate the given metal. Heavy metals have the capability to translocate from soil to the plant parts and can be determined by the transfer factor (TF) (Kumar et al, 2020).…”