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Towards the Concept of Background/baseline Compositions: A Practicable Path?

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Compositional Data Analysis (CoDaWork 2015)

Part of the book series: Springer Proceedings in Mathematics & Statistics ((PROMS,volume 187))

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Abstract

Water geochemistry is often investigated considering a large number of variables, including major, minor and trace elements. Some of these are usually well associated due to coherent geochemical behaviour, but the effect of anthropic factors tends to increase data variability, sometimes obscuring the natural laws governing their relationships. It may thus be difficult to identify geochemical features linked to natural phenomena, as well as to separate geogenic anomalies from the anthropogenic ones, or to define background or baseline concentrations for single chemical elements. This is particularly true at regional level, where numerous phenomena may interact and mix together, forming a complex pattern not easy to interpret. The identification of background or baseline values is particularly difficult due to the compositional nature of chemical variables, so that under the Compositional Data Analysis (CoDA) theory single background or baseline values lose their meaning. However, they are fundamental references for public institutions and government policies. In this contribution a new approach is proposed, aimed at investigating the regionalised structure of the geochemical data by considering the joint behaviour of several chemical elements. The approach is based on the robust CoDA theory, so that the proportionality features of abundance data are fully taken into account, enhancing their relative multivariate behaviour, as well as the influence of outliers. An application example is presented for the groundwater compositions in Tuscany Region, a surface of about 23,000 km\(^2\), where more than 6000 wells have been sampled and analysed. The mapping of robust Mahalanobis distance was able to indicate (1) in which part of the investigated area the pressure toward anomalous behaviour was higher, (2) where the compositions nearest to the barycentre were and (3) if spatial continuity was present in limited portions of the territory.

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    Part of Consorzio LaMMA, http://www.lamma.rete.toscana.it.

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Acknowledgments

The research was developed thanks to funds of the University of Florence (2014) and of Tuscany Region through the Geobasi project (2009–2014). Santiago Thio Fernandez de Henestrosa is thanked for the editing of the manuscript, Vera Pawlowsky-Glahn and an anonymous referee for their valuable suggestions, Elizabeth Hancock for the English language.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Earth Sciences, University of Florence, Via G. La Pira 4, 50121, Firenze, Italy

    A. Buccianti

  2. CNR-IGG (Institute of Geosciences and Earth Resources), via G. Moruzzi, 1, 56124, Pisa, Italy

    B. Nisi & B. Raco

Authors
  1. A. Buccianti
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  2. B. Nisi
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  3. B. Raco
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Correspondence to A. Buccianti .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Computer Science and Applied Mathematics, University of Girona, Girona, Spain

    Josep Antoni Martín-Fernández

  2. Department of Computer Science and Applied Mathematics, University of Girona, Girona, Spain

    Santiago Thió-Henestrosa

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Buccianti, A., Nisi, B., Raco, B. (2016). Towards the Concept of Background/baseline Compositions: A Practicable Path?. In: Martín-Fernández, J., Thió-Henestrosa, S. (eds) Compositional Data Analysis. CoDaWork 2015. Springer Proceedings in Mathematics & Statistics, vol 187. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-44811-4_3

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