Environmental Monitoring and Assessment

, Volume 125, Issue 1–3, pp 19–28 | Cite as

Using of high-resolution topsoil magnetic screening for assessment of dust deposition: comparison of forest and arable soil datasets

Original Article
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Abstract

Magnetic susceptibility (κ) is an easily detectable geophysical parameter that can be used as a proxy or semi-quantitative tracer of atmospheric industrial and urban dusts deposited in topsoil. An enhanced κ value of topsoil is in many cases also associated with high concentrations of soil pollutants (mostly heavy metals). High-resolution magnetic screening of topsoil in areas of high pollution influx is a useful tool for detection of pollution “hot spots”. General and regional screening maps with a grid density of 10 or 5 km have been performed on the basis of forest topsoil measurement only. The purpose of this study was to perform high-resolution magnetic screening with different grid densities in both forested and agricultural areas (arable land). Our large study area (ca. 200 km2) was located in a relatively more polluted region of the central part of Upper Silesia, and a second (small) one (ca. 100 m2) was located in the western part of Upper Silesia, with considerably lower influx of pollution. In the framework of this study, we applied a statistical comparison of data obtained in forested areas and on arable land. The arable soil showed statistically significantly lower κ values, the result of “physical dilution” of the arable layer caused by annual ploughing. Thus arable soils must be avoided during high-resolution field measurement. From semivariograms, it was clear that the spatial correlations in forest topsoil are much stronger than in arable soil, which suggests that a denser measurement grid is required in forested areas.

Keywords

Basic statistic Magnetic susceptibility Soil pollution Topsoil Semivariances 
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Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2006

Authors and Affiliations

  1. 1.Institute of Environmental Engineering PASZabrzePoland
  2. 2.Warsaw University of TechnologyWarszawaPoland

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