Preprint Communication Version 1 Preserved in Portico This version is not peer-reviewed

Sediments as Sentinels of Pollution Episodes in the Middle Estuary of the Tinto River (SW Spain)

Luis Miguel Cáceres Puro
,
Francisco Ruiz
* ORCID logo ,
Javier Bermejo Meléndez
,
Lucía Fernández Sutilo
,
Maria Luz González-Regalado Montero
,
Joaquín Rodríguez Vidal
,
Manuel Abad De los Santos
,
Tatiana Izquierdo Rebraca
ORCID logo ,
Antonio Toscano Grande
,
Paula Gómez Gutiérrez
,
Verónica Romero Aguilar
Version 1 : Received: 15 September 2023 / Approved: 18 September 2023 / Online: 19 September 2023 (03:31:33 CEST)

A peer-reviewed article of this Preprint also exists.

Cáceres, L.M.; Ruiz, F.; Bermejo, J.; Fernández, L.; González-Regalado, M.L.; Vidal, J.R.; Abad, M.; Izquierdo, T.; Toscano, A.; Gómez, P.; Romero, V. Sediments as Sentinels of Pollution Episodes in the Middle Estuary of the Tinto River (SW Spain). Soil Syst. 2023, 7, 95. Cáceres, L.M.; Ruiz, F.; Bermejo, J.; Fernández, L.; González-Regalado, M.L.; Vidal, J.R.; Abad, M.; Izquierdo, T.; Toscano, A.; Gómez, P.; Romero, V. Sediments as Sentinels of Pollution Episodes in the Middle Estuary of the Tinto River (SW Spain). Soil Syst. 2023, 7, 95.

Abstract

Estuaries are excellent environments of identifying pollution episodes that have affected river basins, as their sediments are the final destination of some of the pollutants. This paper studies the geochemical evolution of five elements (As, Co, Cu, Pb, Zn) in a core extracted from the middle estuary of the Tinto River (SW Spain). Results are based on facies interpretation, ICP Atomic Emission Spectrometry analysis, the application of a regional background to obtain the geoaccumulation index and dating. Four pollution episodes have been detected at ~5.8 cal. kyr BP (acid mine drainage?), 4.7-4.5 kyr BP (first mining activities), the 1850-1960 interval (intensive mining) and the second half of the 20th century (intensive mining and industrial inputs). All episodes show an increase in one or more of these elements, as well as changes in their geochemical classes deduced from the geoaccumulation index.

Keywords

sediment; pollution; core; geoaccumulation index; estuary; SW Spain

Subject

Environmental and Earth Sciences, Environmental Science

Copyright: This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

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