Abstract

Areas reclaimed for agricultural uses following coal mining often receive biosolids applications to increase organic matter and fertility. Transport of heavy metals within these soils may be enhanced by the additional presence of biosolids colloids. Intact monoliths from reclaimed and undisturbed soils in Virginia and Kentucky were leached to observe Cu and Zn mobility with and without biosolids application. Transport of Cu and Zn was observed in both solution and colloid associated phases in reclaimed and undisturbed forest soils, where the presence of unweathered spoil material and biosolids amendments contributed to higher metal release in solution fractions. Up to 81% of mobile Cu was associated with the colloid fraction, particularly when gibbsite was present, while only up to 18% of mobile Zn was associated with the colloid fraction. The colloid bound Cu was exchangeable by ammonium acetate, suggesting that it will release into groundwater resources.

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2011

Notes/Citation Information

Published in Applied and Environmental Soil Science, v. 2011, Article ID 762173.

© 2011 Jarrod O. Miller et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2011/762173

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