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Strontium and lead isotopes as environmental tracers in a water supply watershed in Southern Brazil

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Abstract

Urbanization and agriculture increase the risk of water contamination in watersheds. A special concern arises when this water is used for public supply. Conventional hydrochemical methods have been applied to identify contaminants in bulk water; however, there is lack of investigation of their origins. Environmental isotopes can be used to address such knowledge gap by tracking the harmful substance back to its origins. This study evaluates the interference of urbanization as well as inorganic fertilizers in the suspended sediments of the tributaries of two impoundments, whose water supplies 72% of the municipality of Caxias do Sul, Southern Brazil. To achieve this goal, the isotopic ratios 87Sr/86Sr, 208Pb/204Pb, 206Pb/204Pb, 207Pb/204Pb, 208Pb/206Pb and 207Pb/206Pb were selected as geochemical tracers, showing promising results to evaluate sources of contamination in source water. The results of strontium isotopes showed two distinct groups, one marked by the geogenic origin of the sediment and the other by inorganic fertilizers. Lead isotopes indicated that suspended sediments have signatures compatible with the rocks that occur in the region and are in a range of isotopic ratios different from fertilizers or copper sulfate.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank the Public Water and Wastewater Service of the city of Caxias do Sul for the great logistic support to this research.

Funding

The authors declare that no funds, grants or other support was received during the preparation of this manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Hydraulic Research of the Federal University of Rio Grande Do Sul, Av. Bento Gonçalves, 9500, P.O. Box 15.001, Porto Alegre, 91501-970, Brazil

    Tiago De Vargas

  2. Institute of Geosciences of the Federal University of Rio Grande Do Sul, Av. Bento Gonçalves, 9500, P.O. Box 15.001, Porto Alegre, 91501-970, Brazil

    Tiago De Vargas & Ari Roisenberg

  3. Public Water and Wastewater Service of Caxias Do Sul, Nestor Mareira Street, nº 719, Neighborhood Lourdes, Caxias Do Sul, RS, 95052-500, Brazil

    Rossano Belladona

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  1. Tiago De Vargas
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  2. Ari Roisenberg
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  3. Rossano Belladona
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Contributions

All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by TDV, AR and RB. The first draft of the manuscript was written by TDV and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Tiago De Vargas.

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De Vargas, T., Roisenberg, A. & Belladona, R. Strontium and lead isotopes as environmental tracers in a water supply watershed in Southern Brazil. Environ Earth Sci 81, 544 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12665-022-10671-8

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