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Release of particles and metals into seawater following sediment resuspension of a coastal mine tailings disposal off Portmán Bay, Southern Spain

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Abstract

Portmán Bay in Southern Spain is one of the most extreme cases in Europe of anthropogenic impact on the marine ecosystem by the disposal of mine tailings resulting from the processing of sulphide ores. First, the composition and extent of the surficial deposit were investigated from geochemical and metal analysis on high spatial density of sediment samples. Then, a disturbance experiment was conducted in the coastal area off Portmán Bay in order to investigate the potential impact of mining activities on marine ecosystems. Two research vessels were used for that experiment, one performing as a trawler resuspending bottom sediments while the other monitor the behaviour of turbid plumes thus generated and the evolution of their characteristics through time by using a range of acoustic and optical tools together with water and bottom sediment sampling for biogeochemical and metal analyses. The surficial part of the submarine extension of the mine tailings deposit is highly concentrated in As, Cd, Pb, Fe and Zn with peak concentrations adjacent to the present coastline, from where they decrease seawards before reaching average values for the Mediterranean Sea around 50-m water depth. The artificially triggered resuspension of the surface layer of the deposit led to the formation of resuspension plume about 100 m in width and up to 6 m in height. Resuspended plume was composed of fine particles which rapidly aggregated into flocs of 100 μm. While the biggest particles settled rapidly, the finest fraction remained in suspension during at least 3 h. Resuspended sediment and metal concentrations in particles remained at relatively high levels throughout the experiments following triggering. Fe, Pb, and As concentrations in resuspended particles showed a continuous increase while trawling before decreasing in parallel with the settling down of the resuspended sediments. Those metals have higher affinity with fine particles than with coarse ones, so that while the coarsest fraction from sediment plumes settled first, the finest fraction remained in suspension thus increasing the metals/sediments concentration ratio. On the other hand, Cd and Zn concentrations in suspended particles did not change significantly over time, which is thought to be caused by the fast dissolution of such metals in seawater. Beyond waste dumping itself, the observed increase in some metals in marine particulate material could have a significant impact on the adjacent coastal ecosystems due to their toxicity above certain thresholds. The consequences of the resuspension experiment here presented can be extrapolated to the impact of seafloor mining activities leading to the resuspension of metal-rich particle plumes into the water column. The experimental set-up presented here may be further explored for investigating metal behaviour during seafloor mining activities.

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Acknowledgements

Instituto Español de Oceanografía (IEO) provided R/V Àngeles Alvariño and R/V Ramon Margalef, which were used to perform the resuspension experiments. We are in debt with the master, crew and technicians of the vessels. Generalitat de Catalunya autonomous government funding to CRG Marine Geosciences (ref. 2017 SGR 315) of University of Barcelona within its support scheme to excellence research groups is equally acknowledged. A “Bonus Quality Research” grant (CDUSPORT) by the University of Perpignan also supported the cost of metal analyses.

We also thank the Portmán MIDAS cruise shipboard party and their valuable help: David Amblás, Antoni M. Calafat, Jaime Frigola, Olaia Iglesias, Elisabetta Manea, Rut Pedrosa-Pàmies, Sergi Quesada, Xavier Rayo, Jesús Rivera, Aitor Rumín, Michael Tangherlini and Xavier Tubau.

Availability of data and materials

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Funding

This experiment was developed under the MIDAS project (Managing impacts of deep-sea resource exploitation), funded by the European Commission 7th Framework Programme under the theme “Sustainable management of Europe’s deep sea and sub-seafloor resources” (Grant Agreement 603418). This work was also supported from the Spanish government through RTD projects NUREIEV (ref. CTM2013-44598-R) and NUREIEVA (ref. CTM2016-75953-C2-1-R) on far-field and near-field impacts of the Portmán Bay coastal mine tailings deposit.

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Conceptualisation, F.B., A.S.-V., D.A. and M.C.A.; methodology, F.B., M.C.A., A.S.-V., D.A. and C.M.; data collection, F.B., M.C.A., A.S-V., C.M. and the shipboard party; geochemical analysis, A.S.-V., D.A. and C.M.; writing, original draft preparation, F.B.; writing, review and editing, F.B., M.U., M.C.A., A.S.-V., D.A., and J.C.; funding acquisition, M.C.A., A.S.-V., F.B. and D.A. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

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Correspondence to François Bourrin.

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The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

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Responsible Editor: V. V.S.S. Sarma

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Table 3 Evolution through time of SSC, metal concentrations and POC (%) in resuspended sediments at 1 mab. Same parameters are indicated for bottom sediment and in suspended particles before the artificially triggered resuspension experiments (CTD1)

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Bourrin, F., Uusõue, M., Artigas, M.C. et al. Release of particles and metals into seawater following sediment resuspension of a coastal mine tailings disposal off Portmán Bay, Southern Spain. Environ Sci Pollut Res 28, 47973–47990 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-14006-1

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