Abstract

The determination of Cd, Co, Cu, Mn, Ni, Pb and Zn in soils within motor parks 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 (ug/g) of metals in auto-mechanical workshop soils were 5.00 - 5.93 (5.47 ± 0.29), 2.07 - 2.93 (2.44 ± 0.28), 204.33 - 273.83 (240.29 ± 23.04), 402.00 - 486.67 (436.91 ± 35.53), 17.87 - 22.23 (19.23 ± 1.02), 513.00 - 582.00 (567.52 ± 19.35) and 106.67 - 138.33 (119.02 ± 8.77) for Cd, Co, Cu, Mn, Ni, Pb and Zn respectively. The enrichment factors obtained for Cd, Co, Cu, Mn, Ni, Pb and Zn in auto-mechanical workshops were 19.54, 1.80, 29.63, 3.03, 1.80, 172.50 and 12.45 respectively. The inter-element correlation was found among metals in the soils of auto-mechanical workshops using Pearson's correlation co-efficient. There were positive correlations among the metals determined. Metals such as Pb, Cd, Cu and Zn show high degree of contamination, while Co, Mn and Ni shows low degree of contamination in the study sites.

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