ABSTRACT
Soil contamination due to industrial activity in ceramics production is of concern because of the risk of heavy metal pollution. Successive extraction was used to measure and identify the concentrations of Cd, Mn, Ni, and Pb in farming soils near a ceramics company in Nigeria. Furthermore, soil pH and particle size analyses were determined. The concentration of Pb was the highest, followed by that of Ni, Mn, and Cd (lowest), and the mean level of Cd exceeded the regulatory allowed limit of 1.4 mg kg-1. The order of the metals' mobility factors was as follows: Cd > Mn > Ni, Pb. While the Fe-Mn oxide phase had 37% (Mn) and 20 to 83% (Ni), the residual fraction had approximately 30% (Cd) and 19 to 50% (Pb). Soil pollution evaluation was performed using enrichment factor (EF), contamination factor (CF), pollution load index (PLI), and geoaccumulation index (Igeo). Values of EF indicated significant enrichment for all metals, as the EF mean values for Cd, Ni, and Pb in soil were > 1.5. Total EF is of the order Cd > Pb > Ni > Mn. CF results revealed moderate to very high contamination (CF < 1: 3 ≤ CF ≥ 6). Similarly, the PLI indicated moderately to severely polluted soil. The order is 100 m > 200 m > 300 m > 400 m. The Igeo ranged from 1.46 to 2.76 (Cd), 0.07 to 1.62 (Ni), and 0.05 to 2.81 (Pb). The PCA, CA, and EF analyses suggest that the metals are a consequence of anthropogenic activities.
