Major ions wet deposition and trends during the last decade on the eastern Adriatic coast

Abstract

The Croatian Adriatic coast is under the combined influence of local, regional and long-distance pollution sources. Wet deposition of atmospheric pollution contributes to an ecological imbalance of the whole ecosystem, including the sea itself. The Adriatic is ecologically very sensitive, because of its geographic position, complex orography, specific meteorological conditions and number of pollution sources. Predominant airflow is land to sea. The precipitation amount is high in the area of the highest air pollution, which results in high wet deposition. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the load of the Adriatic Sea and coast by atmospheric pollution. For that purpose, the deposition of major ions in bulk daily precipitation samples was examined at five stations along the eastern, Croatian, Adriatic coast over the last 10 years (2001–2010). Results were compared with the previous period in order to evaluate possible trends.