Abstract
The popular concept of enrichment factors (EFs) as a means of identifying and quantifying human interference with global element cycles is evaluated. It is demonstrated that the concept of normalizing element concentrations to an average total crust value is of doubtful merit, for theoretical considerations alone. Serious flaws with EFs include the variable composition of the Earth's crust at any given point compared to the global average, the natural fractionation of elements during their transfer from the crust to the atmosphere through processes such as weathering and winnowing of fines, and the differential solubility of minerals in the weak chemical digestions generally used in environmental studies. Furthermore the impact of biogeochemical processes is neglected. A biomonitoring survey of atmospheric chemistry over a 1.5 million km2 area in northern Europe is used to show that EFs are governed here by completely different processes than anthropogenic activities. As a simple means to assess the maxim...
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