Concentrations, source identification and environmental risk assessment of potentially hazardous elements in agricultural soils of Hamedan, west of Iran

Abstract

ABSTRACT In the current study, a total of 40 agricultural surface soil samples were collected from 40 sites in Hamedan, Iran and the contents of As, Cd, Cr, Cu, Ni, Pb, and Zn were determined by ICP-OES. The average contents of all the analysed elements except Pb were found to be greater than those in the background contents reported for Iran, which could presumably show the anthropogenic sources of these elements. The average EF and PI values decreased in the order of As > Cr > Cu > Cd > Zn > Ni > Pb, while, the rank order of the mean I-geo values followed the order of As > Cr > Cu > Zn > Cd > Ni > Pb. Additionally, the cumulative mean values of RI with 175, demonstrated ‘moderate ecological risk’ across the investigated area. The results of PCC, PCA, and HCA showed that the traffic and agricultural activities could be regarded as the most important anthropogenic factors that affected the content of PTEs in the agricultural soils. In conclusion, an accurate investigation on the probability of the environmental risks due to the agricultural soil pollution by other PTEs and persistent organic pollutants (POPs) is recommended for future works.