Toxic heavy metal contamination assessment and speciation in sugarcane soil

Abstract

Abstract. The increasing heavy metal pollution in the sugarcane soils along the Great Huanjiang River was caused by leakage and spills of Lead (Pb) and Zinc (Zn) tailing dams during a flood event. Copper (Cu), Zn, Pb, Cadmium (Cd), and Arsenic (As) concentrations of soil samples collected from 16 different sites along the Great Huanjiang River coast typical pollution area were analyzed by Inductive Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry (ICP-MS). The mean concentrations of Pb, Cd, Zn, Cu, and As in the sugarcane soils were 151.57 mg/kg, 0.33 mg/kg, 155.52 mg/kg, 14.19 mg/kg, and 18.74 mg/kg, respectively. Results from the analysis of heavy metal speciation distribution showed that Cu, Zn, Pb, and Cd existed in weak acid, reducible, and oxidizable fractions, and the sum of these fractions accounted for significant proportions in sugarcane soils. However, the residual fraction of As with high proportion of reducible fraction indicated that this trace element still poses some environmental risk in the sugarcane soils because of its high content. Assessments of pollution levels revealed that the highest environmental risk was arouse by Pb. In addition, moderate to strong Cd and Zn pollution were found, while As has zero to medium level of pollution and Cu has zero level.

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

“…The contamination order of the studied heavy metals was Cd＞ Pb＞ Cr＞ Ni under both sugarcane monoculture and crop rotation systems. Wang et al, (2018) revealed that Pb, Cd, As, and Zn were the major metal pollutants in sugarcane soils along the Huanjiang River, and their concentrations in all soil samples were higher than the heavy metal background value for Guangxi, indicating that sugarcane soils were polluted severely. In addition, Pb and Cd posed the highest environmental risk and constant threat to the ecosystem and human health.…”

“…These results showed that Cd, Cr, Ni and Pb made a large contribution to pollution in the case of sugarcane monoculture fields compared to crop rotation fields. The single contamination factor (Cf i ) proposed by Hakanson was used to assess the enrichment of the investigated heavy metals in the soils and to measure the pollution levels of sugarcane monoculture fields (Wang et al, 2013, Wang et al, 2018Tang et al, 2020).…”

“…Recently there has been growing evidence of decreased soil productivity as a result of long-term irrigated sugarcane (Saccharum officinarum L.) monoculture joint with the intensification of irrigation and fertilization systems (Umrit et al, 2014;Ouda, 2020;Wu et al, 2020). Sugarcane monoculture is known to affect soil properties by continued additions of pesticides and organic and inorganic fertilizers leading to conditions that might affect soil physicochemical parameters and promotes solubility, bioavailability and mobility of heavy metals (da Silva et al, 2016;Wang et al, 2018;Wang et al, 2020). As a result, a series of soil quality degradation problems have appeared in irrigated sugarcane monoculture areas in Egypt, including heavy metal soil contamination and degradation of soil biological properties which is a major limiting factor affecting soil health.…”

“…Heavy metals have been identified to alter soil physical and chemical properties that affect the biological population, diversity, fertility, and soil health (Sahu and basti 2021). Excessive tilth, irrigation, fertilization and management practices that diminish organic matter and nutrients have also been recognised as primary factors contributing to the yield decline in sugarcane monoculture systems (Umrit et al, 2014;da Silva et al, 2016;Wang et al, 2018;Wang et al, 2020). With each other, these agricultural practices induce dilapidation of the soil chemical, physical and biological properties as evidenced by increased accumulation of heavy metals, decreased levels of SOM, lower cation exchange capacity and pH, increased bulk density, less microbial biomass activity and a build-up of detrimental soil microorganisms (Garside et al 1997b;Solanki et al, 2020;Wang et al, 2020).…”

Magnetic solid phase microextraction using CoFe2O4 nanoparticles for determination of Cu, Cd, Pb and V in sugar cane spirit samples by energy dispersive X-ray fluorescence spectrometry

“…The quantification of metallic specie is important for product quality control, observing the inorganic composition assurance and the presence of toxic elements to humans [5]. These determinations are routinely performed by flame atomic absorption spectrometry (F AAS), [6][7][8][9], inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) [10], electrothermal atomic absorption spectrometry ET AAS [2,4,11,12,13] and UV-Vis spectrophotometry [14,15]. However, the energy dispersive X-ray fluorescence spectrometry (EDXRF) has not been explored for determination of inorganic species in sugar cane spirit.…”