XU Yanying1, LIU Youcun1,2, ZHANG Jun3, CHEN Ming1,2, LIU Zhengfang1, Li Rongxiu4, TURKHON Jolipanguri1
（1. School of Resources and Environmental Engineering , Jiangxi University of Science and Technology , Ganzhou 341000, China;
2. Jiangxi Key Laboratory of Environmental Pollution Control of Mining and Metallurgy, Ganzhou 341000, China； 3. School of Architectural and Surveying & Mapping Engineering, Jiangxi University of Science and Technology , Ganzhou 341000, China; 4. Rizhao Library, Qvfu Normal University, Rizhao 276826, China）
Abstract: The present study takes the Wojiang River in the upper reaches of Ganjiang River, where much rare earth and tungsten deposits located, as the research object. 42 water samples were collected along the river and analyzed for pH, contents of ammonia nitrogen, nitrate nitrogen, nitrite nitrogen, and 10 heavy metals such as Cr, Co, Cd, Pb, Hg, Ni, Mn, Cu, Zn, and As. The Nemero comprehensive pollution index and health risks assessment model were used to evaluate the water pollution status within the Wojiang River basin, and Pearson correlation analysis and principal component analysis methods were applied to explore the sources of heavy metal pollution. The results showed that: (1) the contents of ammonia nitrogen, nitrate nitrogen and nitrite nitrogen in each sampling point tend to be consistent along the river, and negatively correlated with pH values. (2) The heavy metal content of different sampling points in Wojiang River is quite different, with higher values in the main stream than that in the tributary, and a lot of samples from the main stream and all samples from the tributaries are free of heavy metal pollution, while, samples near to the rare earth mines and tungsten mines showed mild and severe heavy metal pollution, respectively. The main health risks of the main stream are carcinogenic heavy metals of As and Cd. (3) Various water quality indicators have a significant correlation with the heavy metal content that is mainly from the surrounding rare earth and tungsten mining areas.
Key words: heavy metal pollution; distribution characteristics; correlation analysis; risk assessment; Ganjiang River
EARTH AND ENVIRONMENT Vol.48, No.5, Tot No.337, 2020, Page 574-583
