Lead, aluminum, and zinc particles were detected in the air of southeastern Coahuila, primarily on the outskirts of Torreón, by Alejandro Lozano, a researcher at the Center for Research in Applied Chemistry.
Although he noted that there are no specific regulations regarding these levels, some areas exceed international recommendations for soil concentrations.
Municipal actions are focused on both citizen reports and the environmental impacts detected during site visits.
The project was funded by the Ministry of the Environment and the State Council of Science and Technology. The final technical report details the findings from the three phases of the project, which collected a total of 139 samples in various municipalities throughout the state.
In the first phase, heavy metals were analyzed in urban dust samples collected in the urban areas of Torreón, Viesca, Ramos Arizpe, and General Cepeda, Coahuila.
“The evaluation of metal concentrations found in the samples considered in this study reveals a significant concentration of the analyzed metals.”
Among these, the highest concentrations of metals were found primarily in the southwest area of Torreón, with Arsenic (As), Chromium (Cr), and Lead (Pb) being the most prominent.
In Ramos Arizpe, in the northeast, the highest concentrations of metals were found, in addition to Chromium and Lead, including Copper (Cu) and Nickel (Ni). In Viesca, the highest concentrations were detected in the southeast region, with Arsenic and Lead being the most prevalent.
In General Cepeda, the study showed that the highest concentrations of Aluminum (Al), Barium (Ba), Iron (Fe), and Manganese (Mn) were found primarily in the northeast region.
In the second phase, the towns of Acuña, Jiménez, Piedras Negras, and Guerrero, Coahuila, were covered, where the evaluation revealed a significant concentration of the analyzed metals.
The highest concentrations of metals were found in the Acuña area, with copper (Cu), chromium (Cr), nickel (Ni), lead (Pb), zinc (Zn), platinum (Pt), strontium (Sr), aluminum (Al), barium (Ba), cobalt (Co), iron (Fe), and manganese (Mn) being the most prominent. In Jiménez, higher concentrations of aluminum, barium, iron, manganese, and strontium were found.
Finally, the third phase covered the municipalities of Candela, Múzquiz, Juárez, and Ocampo. And here, in the Candela area, the highest concentrations of Arsenic (As), Chromium (Cr), Manganese (Mn), and Strontium (Sr) were found; in Múzquiz, the highest concentrations of metals such as Cobalt, Manganese, Aluminum, Chromium, Strontium, Arsenic, Nickel, Barium, Iron, Lead, and Zinc were found.
In the municipality of Juárez, the highest concentrations of Cobalt, Manganese, Copper, Strontium, Barium, Zinc, Nickel, and Iron were found; and finally, in the town of Ocampo, high concentrations of Manganese, Aluminum, Chromium, Arsenic, Copper, Nickel, Strontium, Iron, Cadmium (Cd), and Zinc were found.
It should be mentioned that the study does not determine the causes of these metals, but only their presence, nor does it highlight whether their concentration is above any standard, although, as already mentioned taking into consideration that of soils, many of them are above it.
Source: milenio
