Implementing chemical mass balance model and vulnerability the theories to realize the comprehensive evaluation in an abandoned battery plant

Abstract

In China groundwater contamination has become a serious problem. The assessment and remediation of contaminated sites are greatly important. Moreover, only few studies deal with the influence of metal speciation on human health risk assessment. This paper proposed a comprehensive assessment methodology combined human health risk assessment and groundwater vulnerability assessment for contaminated area, exploring a more reasonable model for the Cd morphology simulation, and utilizing accurate method to calculate the average daily dose by the weight analysis. PHREEQC and Visual MINTEQ were applied and compared to the morphology simulation, the modified of average daily dose and non-modified of average daily dose was investigated, carcinogenic and non-carcinogenic risks were calculated subsequently. The groundwater vulnerability was assessed by the DRASTIC model, the DRASTIC index as the indicator of groundwater vulnerability. The morphology simulation results showed 20 and 13 metal species which were simulated by PHREEQC and Visual MINTEQ, respectively. Cd2+ and CdCl+ were the primary species of Cd in groundwater. The modified average daily dose showed less than the average daily dose in results. The carcinogenic risks showed the species of Cd2+ and CdCl+ were simulated by PHREEQC which were harmful to human health. The DRASTIC index was ranged from 109 to 134 in the studied area, which showed that the area was susceptible to pollution. This method provided a more effective risk assessment model and supplied a fundamental advice for government policy-making and site remediation.