AN EVALUATION OF RESIDUES AT AN OIL REFINERY SITE FOLLOWING FIRES

Abstract

ABSTRACT Soil pollution at the oil refinery at Novi Sad following destruction of crude oil and its products in storage tanks during the Kosovo conflict was investigated. More than 100, 000 t of crude oil and its products were destroyed, and about 90% of these were burnt off, 10% leached and 130 t recovered. The acute injection of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) to the air of the town was widespread depending on the weather conditions and ranged from 1–431, 000 ng/m3. The presence of PAHs, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), and elements in the surface zone and soil core samples taken from various sites were determined up to a depth of 100 cm. Concentrations of PAHs were in the range between 0.75 and 86.19 µg/g dry soil. The contaminated soil can be expected to act as a permanent pollution source, while the mobile constituents are likely to cause groundwater pollution.