Chemical partitioning of aluminium in rocks, soils, and sediments acidified by mining activity

The work presented describes the application of different analytical approaches for study of aluminium mobility in rock, soil, and sediment samples affected by mining activity (secondary quartzites with sulfidic deposits). For this purpose we used a combination of the single extractions, the optimized BCR three-step sequential extraction procedure (SEP), and reactive aluminium determination after chelating ion-exchange on Ostsorb (Iontosorb) Salicyl by a batch technique with flame atomic absorption spectrometry quantification. The single extraction agents H(2)O, KCl, NH(4)Cl, and BaCl(2) were found to be the best for the quantitative estimation of the aluminium mobility in rocks, soils, and sediments caused by acidification of the environment. This fact was confirmed by reactive aluminium determination in the same samples. The vast majority of the aluminium content of samples after application of the optimized BCR three-step SEP is in the residues. The available fraction of aluminium extracted by dilute CH(3)COOH in the first step of this procedure correlates with the reactive aluminium content. The amounts of aluminium released in the second and the third steps and the sums from steps 1-3 of this procedure are closely associated with the aluminium content values obtained by the single dilute HCl leach. The accuracy of results obtained was verified with only informative values for individual fractions of the BCR three-step SEP because of the absence of suitable certified or standard reference materials. The amounts of the reactive aluminium determined in samples was in the range 12-82% of total soluble Al in the filtered H(2)O extracts. It was confirmed that the acidified polluted samples contain the most of reactive Al content, which is responsible for its toxicity.