Urban Geochemistry

Abstract

Urban geochemistry is a fairly new fi eld of geochemical studies, comprising an amalgam of sciences such as environmental chemistry, toxicology, food sciences, sociology, history and engineering. Multidisciplinary studies of the environmental condition of soils and sediments within anthropogenic areas have been performed all over the world, and have led to advances in science as to how we might relate to the soil that we actually live upon, such as clean playgrounds for our children, city awareness maps and health risk assessments. This chapter on urban geochemistry takes you down the road of an important fi eld of research that is so applied and relevant that it cannot, or at least should not, be performed without close collaboration with local city authorities, historians and medical expertise. The authors of this chapter humbly recognize the tremendous work of fellow ambassadors of urban geochemistry all over the world, and realize that we are not able to cover all the important approaches made in different studies, different strategies and analytical methodologies. However, we have tried to explain what we think are important aspects and challenges of urban geochemistry studies today. With the establishment of an Urban Geochemistry group within the International Association of GeoChemistry (IAGC), we hope in the future to create a united approach as to how we should perform soil studies in urban areas and the important results that may follow such surveys. In this chapter we challenge the geoscientists around the world in (at least) one particular area: the introduction of organic substances, such as polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), dioxins and brominated fl ame retardants (BFR) in studies of geochemistry. Consequently, a substantial part of this chapter will be devoted to the hunt for local, active sources of pollutants in the urban environment and their signifi cance upon environmental load, human health and environmental management within the cities and towns around the world, big or small. ©2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd. © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd. All rights reserved.