Lake Baikal is a unique freshwater ecosystem that has been declared a UNESC
O World Heritage Site. It contains high levels of PCBs, and Baikal seal wer
e recently found to have PCDD/F concentrations comparable to those in the B
altic Sea. In this work fish and soil were analyzed to trace the sources of
these compounds to the lake. The fish samples indicated that the PCDD/F an
d PCB contamination of Lake Baikal does not originate from background input
s and that the contamination increases from north to south. The soil invent
ory (quantity of chemical per m(2) ground) was determined at 34 sites aroun
d Lake Baikal and in the Angara River valley. For the PCDD/Fs and most PCBs
, the soil inventory is a good approximation of the cumulative atmospheric
deposition. It varied over a factor of 1000, with the highest levels in Uso
l'ye Sibirskoe, a city 110 km north of the southwestern tip of the lake in
the highly industrialized Angara River valley, and the lowest values in the
pristine areas to the northeast of the lake. A continuous decrease in the
soil inventory was observed moving from Usol'ye S. up the Angara River vall
ey to Lake Baikal and from there northeastward along the lake. This indicat
es that there was a major atmospheric source of these compounds in the Usol
'ye area. The cumulative deposition to the lake was estimated to be 1.2 kg
of TEQ (PCDD/F + PCB). The cumulative deposition of Sigma PCB to Lake Baika
l was comparable to the Sigma PCB inventory in Lake Superior in 1986, indic
ating that the atmospheric emissions in the Usol'ye S, area have been a maj
or source to Lake Baikal. The soil inventories of the PCDD/Fs and PCBs were
highly correlated, and the PCDD/F pattern in the soils was similar to the
PCDD/F pattern in technical PCB mixtures. There is a large chloralkali chem
ical complex in Usol'ye Sibirskoe, and the chloralkali industry has caused
environmental contamination with PCBs elsewhere. This chemical complex is s
uspected to have been the source of the PCB and PCDD/F contamination, but d
ue to the paucity of information about this facility it has not yet been po
ssible to confirm this hypothesis. This study illustrates the utility of so
il contaminant inventories to trace sources of persistent hydrophobic organ
ic contaminants.