25th International Meeting on Organic Geochemistry IMOG 2011

P-145
Current level of the organic pollution in the Bílina river
sediments (Czech Republic)
Eva Francu, Milan Gerńl, Kateřina Zelenková
Czech Geological Survey, Brno, Czech Republic (corresponding author:eva.francu@geology.cz)
The occurrence and distribution of selected
persistent organic pollutants in sediments of
the Bilina River (a tributary of the Elbe River,
Czech Republic and Germany) was
investigated in order to receive current level
of pollution. The area along the Bilina River is
the highest polluted area in the Czech
Republic with extreme risks. During the past
100 years, the region is loaded by the
opencast brown coal mining and coal
processing, petroleum refineries, and
chemical plants. As by-product waste
deposits were accumulated as additional
potential source of secondary contamination.
The Bilina River itself has limited natural part
and most of the river is artificial hydrological
system comprising complex water pipeline
network. In this study the level of the DDT,
PCB, PAH, and compounds indicating oil
contamination was investigated. Samples of
river sediments were taken at 33 sampling
sites on an 82 km longitudinal section of the
Bilina River. Two river sediment samples
from Elbe River before and after Bilina
confluence were collected.
Contamination in the river sediments coming from
petrogenic sources is indicated by an elevated level of
total extractable hydrocarbons (up to 7917 mg/g) and
is supported by high amount of saturated steranes
and hopanes. These sediments have also specific
pattern of selected polyaromatic hydrocarbons (PAH)
(Fig.1). All examined river sediments have very high
amount of the sum of PAHs ranging from 1149 μg/kg
in the sources of the river area to 226307 μg/kg in the
central part. Using the classification diagram designed
by [1] we define three different possible PAH sources.
First petroleum group represent area close to the
refinery; second group includes sources of the river
where the petroleum signatures are present even in
the area is in front of the refinery. That can be
explained by the atmospheric transport of the light
PAH from refinery. The last pyrogenic group
represents samples from natural part of the river and
samples collected under coal waste. The extreme
concentration of the DDT 53 594 μg/kg in the area
together with the presence of p,p'-DDT indicates
current source. This work has been supported by The
Ministry of the Environment of the Czech Republic,
Project MZP-OOHPP-87/08/GP.
IP/(IP+Bghi)
0.8
0.7
0.6
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
Petroleum
Petroleum
Combustion
rs close to
petroleum refinery
Grass/Wood/Coal
Combustion
rs from natural part
or under coal waste
rs from quelle part
0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8
Fl/(Fl+Py)
Figure 1. Bílina river sediments (rs) in the PAH cross
plot of IP/IP+Bghi vs. Fl/Fl+Py ratios (fields designed
by [1])
References
[1] Yunker, M.B., Macdonald, R.W., Vingarzan, R.,
Mitchell H., Goyette, D., Sylvestre, S., 2002. PAHs in
the Fraser River basin: a critical appraisal of PAH
ratios as indicators of PAH. Organic Geochemistry 33,
489-515.
286
Grass/Wood/Coal
Combustion
Petroleum
Combustion