ASSESSMENT OF SELECTED METALS IN SOIL FROM AUTOMOBILE WORKSHOP IN EKITI-NORTH SENATORIAL DISTRICT, EKITI STATE, NIGERIA

Abstract

Anthropogenic actions have often been reported as the causes of increasing background concentration of heavy metal in soil. With the measurement of soil parameters, we can specifically judge the geo-accumulation and transmission tendencies of these metals into the human food chain. Investigating Soil sample collected from automechanic workshops in Ekiti North Senatorial District of Nigeria; the concentration of heavy metal in the soil as well estimating degree of contamination (DOC), pollution load index (PLI) and geo-accumulation index (Igeo) were determined. However in most of the study sites the variation in heavy metal concentration was Fe > Pb > Cu > Co except in DEK, TUN has the highest concentration of Fe, Pb, Cu (411.38mg/kg),74.80mg/kg,21.13mg/kg) respectively and Co is highest in YEE(13.89mg/kg).The DOC is highest in TUN(2.43), with (1.62, 1.67, 1.36, 2.13) reported for KLE, YEE, DEK and YEK respectively which are < 8, implying a low contamination. Also, 0.42 is reported in TUN as the highest value of PLI and (0.29, 0.30, 0.25 and 0.31) were reported for KLE,YEE,DEK and YEK respectively which are < 1 hence no pollution of the study site. The observed geo-accumulation index values for all the study location are negative illustrating that the concentrations of metals in the sites are still at background concentration. More generally, result shows a relative degree of safety, and for future purposes automechanic workshops should be located away from farmland and other food production centres.