Heavy metals assessment of soil in the vinicity of fuel filling station in some selected local government areas of Benue State, Nigeria

The determination of Cd, Co, Cu, Mn, Ni, Pb and Zn in soils within fuel filling stations in some selected local government areas of Benue state were carried out with Flame Atomic Absorption spectrophotometric technique. The method developed by the United State Environmental Protection Agency for (total sobbed) heavy metals in soils, sediments and sludges was used in the preparation of the soil samples for the determination of total metal content in this study. Generally, the ranges and mean concentrations (μg/g) of metals in the soil samples were 4.00-4.80 (4.37±0.27), 1.07-1.85 (1.51±0.26), 41.40-68.13 (58.00±7.13),200.67-295.33 (260.00±32.30), 14.00-19.83 (17.13±1.94), 216.00-276.67 (242.67±18.29) and 100.33-162.33(134.75±21.93) for Cd, Co, Cu, Mn, Ni, Pb and Zn respectively. The concentration of Pb was the highest. The degree of contamination by each metal was estimated by the enrichment factors. The enrichment factors obtained for Cd, Co, Cu, Mn, Ni, Pb and Zn in fuel filling stations were 15.46, 1.87, 3.20, 1.80, 1.96, 73.74 and 13.43, respectively. The inter-element correlation was found among metals in the soils of fuel filling stations using Pearson’s correlation co-efficient. There were positive correlations among the metals determined. Metals such as Pb, Cd, and Zn shows high degree of contamination, while Co, Cu, Mn and Ni shows low degree of contamination in the study sites.

Author(s): 1M. S Dauda., and 2Odoh R

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