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Hydrodynamic release of Pb, Zn, and Cd from impermeable tailings as deduced from physical parameters evolution and multivariate statistical analysis: case study of Jbel Ressas mine waste (North Tunisia)

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Abstract

Tailings are one of the largest pollutant sources in the world. The wind and water leaching were often considered the main distribution tool of their pollutants. However, the carbonate crust precipitation has negated the trace toxic element (TTE) release. To identify the release mode of Pb, Zn, and Cd from mine wastes, the hydrodynamic evolution of waste piles was considered. The macroscopic and microscopic observation, the grain sizes, cohesion particles, density, hydraulic conductivity, and Pb, Zn, and Cd concentrations performed from eight drill cores of the two waste dumps and the principal component and the hierarchical cluster analysis showed that the physical properties of waste piles closely controlled the TTE mobility and migration from the tailings. The obtained data also showed that the upper carbonate layers were first eroded by wind and rainfall. Then, the formation of an impermeable carbonate crust limited the Pb, Zn, and Cd releases. However, the hydrodynamic evolution of the underneath layers was different. As the high pile waste sediments’ weight meaning the lithostatic pressure (Pl), the geostatic ratios (λ = Pf/Pl) were in DII and DIII dumps superior to 0.29 and 0.26, respectively. Therefore, the overpressured fluids increased the mineral dissolution, including the sulfides and carbonates of metals, and hydraulic fracturing that raised the percentages of the mobile TTE and migration indexes. By the secondary pore and fracture volumes, the polluted fluids were progressively channeled towards the underpressured marge (dumps edge) by repetitive (polyphase) fluid pulsations.

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The data that support the findings of this study are available in full in the results section of this paper (Figs. 2 to 9 and Tables 1 to 6).

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Pr. Simon Sheppared for the English language revision.

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Tunisian Ministry of High and Education and Scientific Research had financed this project.

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  1. Laboratoire Géoressources. Centre des Recherches et Technologies des Eaux, Carthage University, B.P. 273, 8020, Soliman, Tunisia

    Rawya Nasraoui, Mariem Trifi & Abdelkrim Charef

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Rawya Nassraoui: funding acquisition, conceptualization, investigation, formal analysis, software, and writing original draft. Mariem Trifi: formal analysis, software, and writing original draft. Abdelkrim charef: investigation, writing—review, validation, and editing.

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Nasraoui, R., Trifi, M. & Charef, A. Hydrodynamic release of Pb, Zn, and Cd from impermeable tailings as deduced from physical parameters evolution and multivariate statistical analysis: case study of Jbel Ressas mine waste (North Tunisia). Environ Monit Assess 195, 410 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-023-10967-7

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