Research Article – Effects of Bauxsol™ on the immobilisation of soluble acid and environmentally significant metals in acid sulfate soils

The effects of Bauxsol, an abundant industrial by-product, on the immobilisation of soluble acid and a range of potentially environmentally toxic metals in artificial and natural acid sulfate soils were investigated. The acid neutralising capacity of Bauxsol™ increased with decreasing pH, which is probably provided not only by basic metal hydroxides, carbonates, and hydroxycarbonates but also by protonation of variably charged particles (e.g. gibbsite and hematite) present in Bauxsol™. Simulation experiment results show that the removal of 9 tested environmentally significant heavy metals can be enhanced by addition of Bauxsol™; an exception was Co. The removal of the added soluble heavy metals by the Bauxsol™ – soil mixtures shows a preferential order of Pb > Fe > Cr > Cu > Zn > Ni > Cd > Co > Mn. For the natural acid sulfate soil without added synthesised metal solution, the retention of the investigated environmentally significant metals is in the following decreasing order : Al > Zn > Fe > Co > Mn.