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Spatial Variability and Source Apportionment of Aliphatic Hydrocarbons in Sediments from the Typical Coal Mining Area

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Abstract

Fifty-four surface sediments from the typical coal mining area were analyzed for pristane, phytane and C8–C40 n-alkanes using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). The spatial distribution, homolog profiles and source apportionment of aliphatic hydrocarbons were investigated. Bimodal distribution pattern, centered at C16–C20 and C27–C33 n-alkanes, were observed in all sediment samples with an obvious dominance of low molecular weight homologues. Principal component analysis-multiple linear regression (PCA-MLR) was used to predict the contributions of different sources. The result implied that natural input was the main source, contribution of which accounted for 60.8%, and the contributions of different sources were estimated as follow: 21.8% for terrestrial higher plants, 24.1% for algae and photosynthetic bacteria, 14.9% for submerged/floating macrophytes, 23.5% for fossil fuel combustion and 15.7% for petroleum hydrocarbons. Moreover, relatively high median concentrations of fossil fuel combustion were observed in Shou County and Fengtai County, indicating the high contribution of fossil fuel combustion in these two areas.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 41672144), the Natural Science Foundation of Anhui Province (1808085QD98), the Natural Science Foundation of Anhui Province (1908085QD154) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (WK2080000118). We wish to thank the editor and the reviewers for their helpful suggestions and comments that greatly improve the research.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. CAS Key Laboratory of Crust-Mantle Materials and Environment, School of Earth and Space Sciences, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, Anhui, China

    Shanshan Wang, Guijian Liu & Yuan Liu

  2. State Key Laboratory of Loess and Quaternary Geology, Institute of Earth Environment, The Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xi’an, 710075, Shaanxi, China

    Shanshan Wang & Guijian Liu

  3. State Key Laboratory of Marine Pollution (SKLMP), Department of Chemistry, City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR, China

    Shanshan Wang & Paul K. S. Lam

  4. Anhui Provincial Engineering Laboratory of Water and Soil Pollution Control and Remediation, Anhui Normal University, Wuhu, 241002, Anhui, China

    Zijiao Yuan

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  1. Shanshan Wang
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  4. Yuan Liu
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  5. Paul K. S. Lam
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Correspondence to Guijian Liu.

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Wang, S., Liu, G., Yuan, Z. et al. Spatial Variability and Source Apportionment of Aliphatic Hydrocarbons in Sediments from the Typical Coal Mining Area. Bull Environ Contam Toxicol 105, 230–236 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00128-020-02938-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00128-020-02938-2

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