Distributional characteristics and sources of elements in soil from typical area of Pearl River Delta economic zone, Guangdong Province, China

Dongguan City, located in the Pearl River Delta economic zone of China, is famous for its rapid developing township-enterprises in the past 30 years. A total of 759 composite soil samples, including 606 surface soil samples and 153 deep soil samples, have been collected in the city. These samples have been analyzed for 13 elements (Al, As, Cu, Cd, Co, Cr, Fe, Hg, Mn, Ni, Pb, Si, and Zn) and other parameters (pH values and organic matter) to evaluate the influence of anthropic activities on the soil environmental quality and to identify the spatial distribution of heavy metals and their possible sources. The results indicate that the average concentrations of heavy metals in soil were significantly lower than the threshold of the second grade of the Soil Environment Quality Standard in China (GB15618-1995) and the soil environmental quality in this area is comparatively good. But in comparison with local soil geochemical baseline values, As, Cd, Cu, Hg, Pb, and Zn have accumulated remarkably. Specifically, the average concentrations of As, Cd, Cu, and Hg in the small part samples of the west plain and central areas are higher than the national second-grade quality standard, indicating some level of contamination. Multivariate and geostatistical methods have been applied to differentiate the influences of natural processes and human activities on the concentration of heavy metals in surface soils in the study area. Cluster and factor analyses result in the grouping of Al, As, Cr, Cu, Fe, Ni, and Si into factor F1; Co, Mn, Pb, and Zn into F2; and Cd and Hg into F3. The spatial pattern of the three factors may be well demonstrated by geostatistical analysis. It is shown that the first factor could be considered as a natural source controlled by parent material. The second factor could be referred to as “industrial and traffic pollution sources”. The source of the third factor is mainly controlled by long-term anthropic activities, including agricultural activities, fossil fuel consumption, and atmospheric deposition. © 2015, Science Press, Institute of Geochemistry, CAS and Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.