Levels of Heavy Metals in Ground Water from Chantan Dump Site in Ghana

Abstract

A study was undertaken to determine the concentrations of heavy metals in the ground water from landfill leachiest in Chantan, a suburb of Accra. Six wells were excavated from the Dump site and the concentrations for heavy metal such as copper, chromium, arsenic and zinc were monitored using wet digestion technique. HCl and HNO 3 were used followed by atomic absorption spectrophotometry. The heavy metals were quantified using external calibration with standards. Copper had the highest mean concentration of 1.410 mg/l in water from well three (3). This is above the maximum admissible and desirable limit set by the World Health Organization (WHO), an international organization. Chromium recorded the minimum mean concentration of 0.002 mg/l and this was found in wells (2) and (3). Generally, the study revealed that 83.3 % of water samples had mean concentrations below the WHO maximum admissible and desirable limit.