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Fingerprinting Hydrocarbons in a Contaminated Soil from an Italian Natural Reserve and Assessment of the Performance of a Low-Impact Bioremediation Approach

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Abstract

An environmentally friendly procedure suitable to restore a protected area was evaluated at laboratory scale. Soil contaminated by high molecular weight (C > 10) aliphatic hydrocarbons and by chromium was withdrawn from the study site and a qualitative study of soil hydrocarbon components was first performed in order to assess the potential source of contamination. To this aim, a number of characteristic diagnostic ratios of hydrocarbon components were derived by processing chromatographic data, and were used as indicators for distinguishing anthropogenic from natural hydrocarbons. Then, the efficiency of landfarming for soil remediation was tested by comparing the effect of a few selected amendments and by monitoring the fate of chromium. Soil microbial abundance and activity were also evaluated. Results showed that soil hydrocarbons were mainly of anthropogenic origin and land treatment allowed effective degradation by native microbial populations even in the absence of amendments. The investigated procedures had no effect on the mobilisation of chromium that remained in its stable form of Cr(III). Conventional land treatment may therefore be an effective and safe procedure for the removal of hydrocarbons even in the presence of chromium, and may be applied to areas where low-impact procedures are strictly required.

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Acknowledgements

The Assessorato all’Ecologia della Regione Puglia (Apulia Region Agency for Ecology) is gratefully acknowledged for funding this research.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Istituto di Ricerca Sulle Acque, Viale De Blasio 5, 70132, Bari, Italy

    Angela Volpe, Guido Del Moro & Vito Felice Uricchio

  2. Dipartimento di Scienze e Tecnologie Biologiche ed Ambientali, Università del Salento, Lecce, Italy

    Stefania D’Arpa

  3. Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Istituto di Ricerca Sulle Acque, Area della Ricerca Roma 1 Montelibretti, Via Salaria km. 29300, 00016, Monterotondo, Rome, Italy

    Simona Rossetti & Valter Tandoi

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  1. Angela Volpe
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  2. Stefania D’Arpa
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Correspondence to Angela Volpe.

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Volpe, A., D’Arpa, S., Del Moro, G. et al. Fingerprinting Hydrocarbons in a Contaminated Soil from an Italian Natural Reserve and Assessment of the Performance of a Low-Impact Bioremediation Approach. Water Air Soil Pollut 223, 1773–1782 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11270-011-0982-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11270-011-0982-7

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