Assessing anthracene and arsenic contamination within Buffalo River sediments

Abstract

Anthracene and arsenic contamination concentrations at various depths in the Buffalo River were analyzed in this study. Anthracene is known to cause damage to human skin and arsenic has been linked to lung and liver cancer. The Buffalo River is labelled as an Area of Concern defined by the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement between Canada and the United States. It has a long history of industrial activity located in its near vicinity that has contributed to its pollution. An ordinary kriging spatial interpolation technique was used to calculate estimates between sample locations for anthracene and arsenic at various depths. The results show that both anthracene and arsenic surface sediment (0-30cm) is less contaminated than all subsurface depths. There is variability of pollution within the different subsurface levels (30-60cm, 60-90cm, 90-120cm, 120-150cm) and along the river course, but major clusters are identified throughout all depths for both anthracene and arsenic. Copyright © 2012 Adrian Gawedzki and K. Wayne Forsythe.