Effects of different water management strategies on the stability of cadmium and copper immobilization by biochar in rice-wheat rotation system

Abstract

Chemical immobilization of heavy metals is a simple, low-cost, and environment-friendly technology for remediation of heavy metals contaminated soils. However, changes in environmental conditions, such as water management, acid deposition, temperature fluctuation, etc., might result in release of metal ions from the fixation sites, and the long-term stability of immobilization remediation is unclear. This study attempted to investigate the impact of water management strategies (wetting-drying cycle and dry cycle) on the stability of heavy metal immobilization by one-time application of biochar during 3 consecutive years of rice-wheat crop in Cu/Cd-contaminated soil. The transformation and accumulation of Cd and Cu in soil-crop system and the morphololgy and composition of biochar were analyzed. The results revealed that wetting-drying cycle and drying treatments reduced the contents of available Cd and Cu in soil by 15.9%–17.7% and 23.9%–31.5% and by 19.8%–62.7% and 16.1%–65.0%, as well as increased soil pH by 0.11–0.31 and 0.17–0.56, respectively. In the wetting-drying cycle treatment, biochar was more favorable for decrease in Cd and Cu accumulation in crop, when compared with that in dry treatment; however, the differences were insignificant in the subsequent years. Although the different water management strategies had no obvious effect on the soil total C, physicochemical analysis of the biochar collected after pot experiments indicated that the obvious structural decomposition of biochar in the drying treatment may have resulted in the release of heavy metals immobilized in biochar. These findings help in better understanding of the long-term immobilization mechanism of biochar in soil-plant system.