RT Journal Article
T1 The Evolution of Pollutant Concentrations in a River Severely Affected by Acid Mine Drainage: Río Tinto (SW Spain)
A1 Olías Álvarez, Manuel
A1 Ruiz Cánovas, Carlos
A1 Macías Suárez, Francisco
A1 Basallote Sánchez, María Dolores
A1 Nieto Liñán, José Miguel
AB The Río Tinto, located in the Iberian Pyrite Belt (SW Spain), constitutes an extreme case ofpollution by acid mine drainage. Mining in the area dates back to the Copper Age, although large-scalemining of massive sulfide deposits did not start until the second half of the 19th century. Due toacidic mining discharges, the Río Tinto usually maintains a pH close to 2.5 and high concentrations ofpollutants along its course. From a detailed sampling during the hydrological year 2017/18, it wasobserved that most pollutants followed a similar seasonal pattern, with maximum concentrationsduring autumn due to the washout of secondary soluble sulfate salts and minimum values duringlarge flood events. Nevertheless, As and Pb showed different behavior, with delayed concentrationpeaks. The dissolved pollutant load throughout the monitored year reached 5000 tons of Fe, 2600 tonsof Al, 680 tons of Zn, and so on. While most elements were transported almost exclusively in thedissolved phase, Fe, Pb, Cr, and, above all, As showed high values associated with particulate matter.River water quality data from 1969 to 2019 showed a sharp worsening in 2000, immediately after themine closure. From 2001 on, an improvement was observed.
PB MDPI
SN 2075-163X
YR 2020
FD 2020-06
LK http://hdl.handle.net/10272/18926
UL http://hdl.handle.net/10272/18926
LA eng
NO Olías Álvarez, M., Ruiz Cánovas, C., Macías Suárez, F., Basallote Sánchez, M. D., & Nieto Liñán, J. M. (2020). The Evolution of Pollutant Concentrations in a River Severely Affected by Acid Mine Drainage: Río Tinto (SW Spain). Minerals, 10(7), 598. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/min10070598
NO This work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness through the research projects CAPOTE (CGL2017-86050-R) and SCYRE (CGL2016-78783-C2-1-R). M.D. Basallote thanks the Spanish Ministry of Science and nnovation for the postdoctoral fellowship granted under application reference IJC2018-035056-I. F. Macías was funded by the R&D FEDER Andalucía 2014-2020 call through the project RENOVAME (FEDER; UHU-1255729)
DS Repositorio Institucional de la Universidad de Huelva
RD 15 jun 2026