Settled dust from urban and suburban roads in an industrial city area: Location and seasonal differences in metal content

Abstract

Settled road dust, present on all roads surfaces in a relatively high abundance, is a complex of particles-ranging from nanosized to microsized-from both natural and anthropogenic sources and may pose possible risk to the biosphere as well as influence the atmosphere because of the road dust resuspension. Geographical and seasonal differences in heavy metal content of the settled road dust were studied at two sites: urban site with a heavy traffic in the industrial city of Ostrava, Czech Republic and suburban site of Ostrava with a negligible traffic load in settlement Ludgerovice. Dust samples were collected monthly during the period from March to October 2015. Obtained dust samples were homogenized and subsequently analyzed by Inductively Coupled Plasma Atomic Emission Spectroscopy; the results were then assessed by multivariate statistical methods (Principal components analysis, Factorial analysis on mixed data). The difference in the content of Ba, Cr, Cu, Mn, Ni, Pb, Sb, Sn, V, and Zn was explainable mainly by the factor of the site only the content of Fe was significantly dependent on the month of sampling. The contents of the particular elements and the correlations found among them confirm the assumption that heavy metals detected in the road dust samples from the urban site most likely originated primarily from the traffic-and particularly from the non-combustion processes.