The impact of the plants Kola Metallurgical Company on soils and plants
A. I. SYSO1, YU. V. ERMOLOV1, E. G. ZIBZEEV2, T. I. SIROMLYA1, S. A. KHUDYAEV1, A. S. CHEREVKO1
1Institute of Soil Science and Agrochemistry of SB RAS, Novosibirsk, Russia
2Central Siberian Botanical Garden of SB RAS, Novosibirsk, Russia
Keywords: heavy metals, contamination, soils, plants, phytocoenosis, coenotic diversity, Kola peninsula
Abstract
The article presents the results of the study of soil properties and composition, as well as species diversity of plant coenoses in areas located at different distances from the enterprises of the Kola Metallurgical Company (KMC) in the Monchegorsk city and Nickel municipal settlement. The impacted areas were found to have maximal concentrations of Ni, Cu, Co. The ratios of soil mobile Cu and Ni to Ca and Mg in the organogenic topsoil horizons indicated their phytotoxicity. The plants in such areas showed morphological signs of acidic damage, their species diversity being minimal. High soil content of Ni, Cu, Co, Cr was suggested to be resultant not only from the technogenic contamination, but also by the natural geochemical anomalies above the ore deposits, as the GMC enterprises are located in the vicinity of such deposits. Technogenic geochemical anomalies had developed near the GMC enterprises; soil Ni, Cu, Co, Cr content and mobility were shown to decrease with increasing distance from the enterprises, whereas plant species diversity increased. Some weak and confounding correlations were revealed between plant biodiversity and soil properties, the correlation being statistically significant for soil Cu and Ni.
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