Abstract
The present study was conducted at a coal mining affected forest and a non-affected forest to analyze the seasonal changes in soil physico-chemical properties, incorporate additive and weighted soil quality index (SQI) to determine the soil quality and check the affected forest soil pollution status. Comparative SQI shows that the non-affected forest presented higher SQI in all the seasons (winter, spring, summer and autumn). However, in both the forest the seasonal additive and weighted SQI was categorised as autumn > summer > spring > winter and the overall SQI of the soil depth was ranked as 0–10 > 10–20 > 20–30 cm. The Single pollution index (PI) points out that cadmium (Cd) was the main potential contributor to soil pollution while the Pollution load index (PLI) and Nemerow integrated pollution index (NIPI) revealed moderate soil pollution status. The result summarized that coal mining activities can elevate soil deterioration rate, such as loss in soil organic carbon, reduction in nutrient availability, and slowing down the rejuvenating process of forest soil.
Highlights
The forest cover in India is about 24% of the total geographical area and varies from tropical evergreen forests (Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Western Ghats and Northeastern states) to dry alpine scrub in the high Himalayan region (Mishra et al, 2019)
Underground and open-pit coal mining includes a phase of development that involves the removal of native soils and surrounding rocks, which are low in coal content (
These mine dumps leads to declination of the soil quality due to stock piling of overburden (OB) dumps (Mukhopadhyay & Maiti, 2011), as these dumps are low in Soil Organic Carbon (Ahirwal et al, 2017), poor in nutrients, contain loosely adhered particles of shale, stones, boulders, cobbles, and so forth devoid of real soil characters
Summary
The forest cover in India is about 24% of the total geographical area and varies from tropical evergreen forests (Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Western Ghats and Northeastern states) to dry alpine scrub in the high Himalayan region (Mishra et al, 2019). Variety of rock types with different compositions are exposed to atmospheric conditions and undergo accelerated weathering and these materials are often deposited nearby as mine waste dumps (Bhuiyana et al, 2010)
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