Spatiality, seasonality and ecological risks of heavy metals in the vicinity of a degenerate municipal central dumpsite in Enugu, Nigeria

BACKGROUND Improper waste disposal is responsible for the contamination of both surface and ground water resources. Heavy metals leached from improperly disposed solid waste constitute grave environmental and health hazards because of their toxic and persistent nature. There are thousands of open dumps in Nigeria one of which is the Enugu State Waste Management Authority dumpsite. METHOD Forty sampling nodes were systematically established around the Enugu State waste Management Authority central dumpsite located at Ugwuaji, Enugu State, Nigeria. Ten heavy metals (arsenic, cadmium, cobalt, copper, chromium, iron, lead, manganese, nickel and zinc) were sampled at different depths of each node in both rainy and dry seasons. RESULT Iron and lead were the predominant metals in the vicinity of the waste dump with average values of 132.10 mg/kg and 117.52 mg/kg respectively. The order of abundance of the ten heavy metals monitored is Pb > Fe > As > Zn > Cu > Co > Ni > Cd > Cr > Mn. Generally, there was significant correlation (0.25 to 0.74) among all the metals except between cobalt and manganese in the rainy season. In the dry season, all the metals were significantly correlated (0.29 to 0.813) except for copper and lead, copper and arsenic, zinc and arsenic, and cobalt and manganese. The concentrations of most of the heavy metals approached a constant level at a depth of 1 m. On the other hand, the concentrations of arsenic, cobalt and iron continued to decrease even at a depth of 2 m. The pollution loading index values for the soil are 1.706 for rainy season and 2.54 for dry season. CONCLUSION The high pollution loading index represents a significant level of deterioration. It can be concluded that the dumpsite constitute a serious environmental and health hazard.