Assisted natural remediation of a trace element-contaminated acid soil: An eight-year field study

13 páginas.-- 4 figuras.-- 6 tablas.-- 39 referencias

© 2015 Soil Science Society of China. There are many remediation techniques for organic contaminated soils, but relatively few of them are applicable to trace element-contaminated soils. A field experiment was carried out to investigate assisted natural remediation (ANR) of an acid soil contaminated by As, Cd, Cu, Zn and Pb using one inorganic amendment, sugar beet lime (SL), and two organic amendments, biosolid compost (BC) and leonardeite (LE). The experiment was arranged in a completely randomized block design with four treatments in three replicates: 1) a non-amended control (NA); 2) SL amended at 30 Mg ha-1 year-1; 3) BC amended at 30 Mg ha-1 year-1 and 4) LE amended at 20 Mg ha-1 year-1 plus SL amended at 10 Mg ha-1 year-1 (LESL). The amended plots received two doses of each amendment (DO2): one in October 2002 and another in October 2003. The plots were then divided in half into two subpolts and one subplot received another two doses of the same amendments (DO4) in October 2005 and October 2006. In 2011, the pH values of the amended soils were greater than that of the NA soil, with the SL-amended soil showing the highest pH. Total organic carbon (TOC) was also greater in the amended soil, and greater with DO4 than with DO2. Amendments reduced the concentrations of 0.01 mol L-1 CaCl2-extractable Cd, Cu and Zn, especially in the SL-amended soil. Plant cover of colonizing vegetation was enhanced by amendments, but was independent of amendment doses. Changes in soil properties from 2003 to 2011 showed that the first amendment application of DO2 caused a high differentiation between all the amendment treatments and the NA treatment. After the second application of DO2, soil pH and TOC continued increasing slowly. Further two applications of amendments (DO4) caused differences only in the organic treatments. Plant cover increased over time in all the treatments including NA. It could be concluded that the slow and steady natural remediation of this soil could be enhanced by amendment application (ANR).

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