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Assessment of contamination and health risk of heavy metals in selected water bodies around gold mining areas in Ghana

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Abstract

Heavy metal contamination of selected rivers in Ghana was studied as part of a bigger project aimed at setting background standard for heavy metals in the Ghanaian environment. Water samples were collected from major mining and eight pristine areas. The samples were acid digested with aqua-regia and analyzed with ICP-MS for As, Cd, Hg, Zn, Cu, Mn, Fe, Cr, Al, V, Co, Ni, and Pb. The average concentrations (mg/L) from the pristine sites ranged from 0.002 ± 0.00(As) to 0.929 ± 0.06 (Fe) and 0.002 ± 0.00 (Pb) to 20.355 ± 5.60 (Fe) from the mining sites. With the exception of Al, Fe, and Mn, the metals level were found to be within the WHO and USEPA guideline limits. Hazard quotients (HQ) for ingestion and dermal contact for pristine and mining samples ranged from 3.00E−04 (Cu) to 0.84 (Cr) and 2.40E−06 (Cu) to 7.44 (As), respectively. The carcinogenic risk (CR) for ingestion and dermal contact ranged from 5.03E−06 to 1.71E−07 (Cr) and 4.22E−08 to 1.44E−09 (Cr), respectively. Arsenic showed a CR value higher than the acceptable limit (1.8E−02) from the mining sites which poses carcinogenic health threat. Multicriteria ranking suggests Birim river (EAM) as the most contaminated. The pattern recognition and multicriteria approach in characterizing the heavy metal contamination (for the first time in the case of Ghana) from the various sites will provide fresh insights into the risk assessment of heavy metals in contaminated surface waters.

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Acknowledgements

This data reported in this paper was obtained at the Central Analytical Research Facility (CARF) operated by the Institute for Future Environments, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia. Access to CARF is supported by generous funding from QUT’s Science and Engineering Faculty QUT.

The authors are also grateful to CARF staff (Charlotte Allen, Sunny Hu, Irina Kinaev, Aasrshi Bhargav and David Steel) for their immeasurable support and training on the laboratory instruments and equipment during this work.

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  1. Environmental Group, Department of Chemistry, School of Physical Sciences, University of Cape Coast, Cape Coast, Ghana

    George Yaw Hadzi & David Kofi Essumang

  2. School of Chemistry, Physics and Mechanical Engineering, Science and Engineering Faculty, Queensland University of Technology (QUT), 2 George Street, Brisbane, QLD, 4001, Australia

    Godwin A. Ayoko

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  1. George Yaw Hadzi
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  2. David Kofi Essumang
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David K. Essumang conceived and designed the research topic. George Y. Hadzi carried out data collection, performed the laboratory experiments, analyzed the data, and wrote the manuscript. Godwin A. Ayoko and David K. Essumang edited, shaped, and provided critical feedback on the manuscript. All authors contributed to revising the article critically for intellectual content and approved the version for publication.

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Correspondence to George Yaw Hadzi.

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Hadzi, G.Y., Essumang, D.K. & Ayoko, G.A. Assessment of contamination and health risk of heavy metals in selected water bodies around gold mining areas in Ghana. Environ Monit Assess 190, 406 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-018-6750-z

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