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Assessment of potentially toxic pollutants and urban livability in a typical resource-based city, China

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Abstract

Toxic pollutants are affecting the environment on a global scale. To quantify the extent of the elemental pollution in Peixian, a typical Chinese city, we collected 332 soil samples from agricultural, residential, woodland, and hydrological environments. Using multivariate statistical and geostatistical analyses, the results indicate that contaminants including chromium (Cr), zinc (Zn), copper (Cu), lead (Pb), cadmium (Cd), and arsenic (As) may share common sources such as commercial activities, coal mining activities, water transportation, power generation, and livestock manure. The presence of mercury (Hg) in the southern part of the study area, however, is almost entirely attributed to nearby mining activities. The value of contamination index was the highest in hydrological environments. Health exposure risk assessments of the elements were also investigated. With the exception of Pb, the potentially toxic elements in the study area do not pose a severe non-carcinogenic health risk. At the levels observed in our study, however, Pb may pose a non-carcinogenic risk to children. Based on these results, the area’s livability is assessed. The urban livability analysis shows that the livability level is higher in the western part of the study area than it is in the eastern part.

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Funding

This study was supported by the Open Research Fund of Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Resources and Environmental Information Engineering, CUMT (grant number JS201801), research on the technologies for controlling land and water resources in the Huang-Huai-Hai coal mining subsidence area under the Ministry of Natural Resources of the People’s Republic of China (grant number 2018-01-34), and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (grant number 2017XKZD14). We thank Accdon (www.accdon.com) for its linguistic assistance during the preparation of this manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Resources and Environmental Information Engineering, China University of Mining and Technology, Xuzhou, 221116, China

    Min Tan, Hua Zhao, Gang Li & Junfeng Qu

  2. Xuzhou Institute of Ecological Civilization Construction, Xuzhou, 221008, China

    Min Tan & Junfeng Qu

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  1. Min Tan
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  2. Hua Zhao
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  3. Gang Li
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Correspondence to Junfeng Qu.

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Tan, M., Zhao, H., Li, G. et al. Assessment of potentially toxic pollutants and urban livability in a typical resource-based city, China. Environ Sci Pollut Res 27, 18640–18649 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-020-08182-9

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