Downstream Distribution and Postdepositional Mobilization of Cadmium in Alluvial Soils

Table 1

Examples of studies using alluvial soils to reconstruct the pollution history of a river catchment.

River-region/country	Source of metal(loid)s	Main findings/contributions	Ref
Uferbach catchment, lower Saxony, Harz mountains, Germany	Mining of Fe ores (pyrite and marcasite)	Four phases of mining and smelting activities in the catchment were distinguished	[15]
Geul river, Belgium	Pb-Zn mining	Metal fluxes back to the 17th century were reconstructed. Vertical profiles are subdivided into three major units corresponding to different industrial periods	[16]
Ouse river, UK	Pb mining	Geochemical and mineralogical analysis of sedimentary profiles gave evidence that contamination by lead mining began in the Roman period	[7]
Rio Tinto, Spain	Mining of a massive sulphide deposit	Dating of cores from the alluvial plain indicated that mining of sulphide deposits go back to 3000 years BP	[17]
Wurm river, west of Germany	Municipal wastewater and industrial pollution	Degree of recent and historical pollution of alluvial soils and diachronic sedimentation rates varied explicitly over a small scale sedimentation rates were derived and varied in a range 0.6–1.3 cm a^−1	[18]
Maoniu river and the AnningRiver, Sichuan, China	Rare elements mining	Based on ^210Pb dating and element concentrations of the sediment core, it was found that the Cd accumulation rate of the flood plain increased from 0.16 to 2.22 μg·cm^−2·yr^−1 over the past 100 years	[19]
Morava river, Czech Republic	Industrial contamination	Changes in sedimentation rate can be attributed to erosion of the past channel system likely due to climatic extremes	[21]
Morava river, Czech Republic	Industrial contamination	Sediments from regulated river banks qualitatively reflected the actual, local contamination of the river system	[20]
Litavka river, Czech Republic	Polymetallic (Ag–Pb–Zn–Sb) ore mining and smelting	Integration of geochemical analysis, stratigraphic correlations adopted from fluvial sedimentology, historical maps, and aerial photographs using geoinformatic systems	[22]
Ohře river, Germany and Czech Republic	Ancient and modern ore mining	Most contamination of the Ohře is due to Hg and U found in sediments stored in historic channels. Necessity to use GIS tools and appropriately selected sampling sites with respect to past channel dynamics	[23]
Ploučnice river, Czech Republic	Uranium mining	Very detailed study, integrating geochemical analysis, geophysical methods knowledge of fluvial systems, and the evaluation of historical maps and aerial photographs using geoinformatic systems	[24]