TY - JOUR
T1 - Trace Heavy Metal Contamination of Urban Water Bodies in Central Asia
T2 - Its Distribution, Source Detection, and Probabilistic Health Risk Assessment for Recreational and Household Use of Water
AU - Bahetnur, Yingkar
AU - Lee, Woojin
N1 - Funding Information:
The research was supported by the Nazarbayev University Research Grant (021220FD1051) and the Ministry of Higher Education and Science of the Republic of Kazakhstan (AP14870836). The authors thank the Republican State Enterprise “Kazhydromet” for providing water sample data and Dana Zhaxylykova and Tolkyn Orazbay for preliminary data analyses.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 The Authors. Published by American Chemical Society.
PY - 2023
Y1 - 2023
N2 - Water scarcity, security, and deterioration of water quality have been serious environmental issues in Central Asia. This study has investigated the contamination of the Esil river, the only transboundary river originating in Kazakhstan, and implemented the human health risk assessment of heavy metals (HMs; Cd, Pb, Cr(VI), and As) in its relevant 15 surface water bodies. HM concentrations in 2893 water samples were measured over 6 years (2014-2019). The river’s water quality was classified between “marginal” and “good,” but nine sites revealed worsened quality during the period. The monitored HMs’ median concentrations followed a decreasing order of Cr(VI) (0.0015 mg/L) = As (0.0015 mg/L) > Pb (0.0009 mg/L) > Cd (0.00005 mg/L). Human-induced behaviors, especially industrial activities, were observed to influence the water quality negatively. Due to the growth of cities, municipal wastes and the release of pollutants during construction activities were potential origins of HMs, too. Two exposure scenarios for the human health risk assessment were investigated: the risks from a recreational activity scenario were acceptable, but concerning values were obtained from a household use scenario, including seven sites with hazard index (HI) > 1 and a maximum cancer risk of 7.22
AB - Water scarcity, security, and deterioration of water quality have been serious environmental issues in Central Asia. This study has investigated the contamination of the Esil river, the only transboundary river originating in Kazakhstan, and implemented the human health risk assessment of heavy metals (HMs; Cd, Pb, Cr(VI), and As) in its relevant 15 surface water bodies. HM concentrations in 2893 water samples were measured over 6 years (2014-2019). The river’s water quality was classified between “marginal” and “good,” but nine sites revealed worsened quality during the period. The monitored HMs’ median concentrations followed a decreasing order of Cr(VI) (0.0015 mg/L) = As (0.0015 mg/L) > Pb (0.0009 mg/L) > Cd (0.00005 mg/L). Human-induced behaviors, especially industrial activities, were observed to influence the water quality negatively. Due to the growth of cities, municipal wastes and the release of pollutants during construction activities were potential origins of HMs, too. Two exposure scenarios for the human health risk assessment were investigated: the risks from a recreational activity scenario were acceptable, but concerning values were obtained from a household use scenario, including seven sites with hazard index (HI) > 1 and a maximum cancer risk of 7.22
KW - carcinogenic risk
KW - Esil river basin
KW - heavy metals
KW - noncarcinogenic risk
KW - spatiotemporal evaluation
KW - surface water
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U2 - 10.1021/acsestwater.3c00268
DO - 10.1021/acsestwater.3c00268
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85166764524
SN - 2690-0637
VL - 3
SP - 2765
EP - 2775
JO - ACS ES and T Water
JF - ACS ES and T Water
ER -
