CHARACTERIZATION OF THE PAH LOAD OUTSIDE AN ALUMINUM SMELTER ON THE SWEDISH BALTIC COAST

The load of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons was investigated in a wat er area outside an aluminium smelter on the Swedish Baltic coast. The load was evaluated in terms of PAH content in settling particulate mat ter, bottom surface sediments and in two bivalves, blue mussels (Mytil us edulis) and Baltic tellins (Macoma baltica). The total PAH concentr ations (15 compounds) varied between 5.3 and 41 mug/g (dry wt.) in the settling particulate matter samples and between 14 and 211 mug/g (dry wt.) in the bottom surface sediments. The two bivalves showed concent rations of 6.2 mug/g (dry wt.) for blue mussels and 167 mug/g (dry wt. ) for Baltic tellins, respectively, collected outside the aluminium sm elter. The PAH flux in the water area outside the aluminium smelter wa s estimated to approximately 1 ton of PAH/year in the 50 km2 Closest t o the smelter. To characterise the PAH emissions found in the water ar ea outside the aluminium smelter in comparison to emission profiles fr om other sources in Sweden, use has been made of a multivariate statis tical method. The result of this analysis showed that the emission sou rce pattern of the sediment trap samples from the area outside the sme lter was significantly different from all other source areas compared in the analysis.