Journal
ENVIRONMENTAL POLLUTION
Volume 158, Issue 7, Pages 2465-2471Publisher
ELSEVIER SCI LTD
DOI: 10.1016/j.envpol.2010.03.027
Keywords
Chemical speciation; Critical Limit; Free ion concentration; Mercury (II); Organic matter; Soil
Categories
Funding
- [AQ0805]
- Natural Environment Research Council [ceh010023] Funding Source: researchfish
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Published chronic toxicity data for Hg(II) added to soils were assembled and evaluated to produce a data set comprising 52 chronic end-points, five each for plants and invertebrates and 42 for microbes. With end-points expressed in terms of added soil Hg(II) contents, Critical Limits were derived from the 5th percentiles of species sensitivity distributions, values of 0.13 mu g (g soil)(-1) and 3.3 mu g (g soil organic matter)(-1) being obtained. The latter value exceeds the currently recommended Critical Limit, used to determine Hg(II) Critical Loads in Europe, of 0.5 mu g soil organic matter)(-1). We also applied the WHAM/Model VI chemical speciation model to estimate concentrations of Hg2+ in soil solution, and derived an approximate Critical Limit Function (CLF) that includes pH; log [Hg2+](crit) = -2.15 pH -17.10. Because they take soil properties into account, the soil organic matter-based limit and the CLF provide the best assessment of toxic threat for different soils. For differing representative soils, each predicts a range of up to 100-fold in the dry weight-based content of mercury that corresponds to the Critical Limit. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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