Heavy Metals and Their Relationship to Solids in Urban Runoff

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Abstract
Although a considerable amount of work has been done in order to develop models for estimating metal loadings in urban runoff, some basic information on the relationships between various storm water parameters is still lacking. In a previous study at a viaduct road runoff site in Pullman, WA, metal input from sources other than motor vehicles was excluded and a definite relationship was observed between total solids and metal concentrations. This study was undertaken to determine if the same models can be used for storm events occurring at a different location where the input of solids and metals from sources other than motor vehicles was not controlled. Storm runoff was collected at 20 different roadside sites during each of two separate storm events at the non-industrialized area of Logan, UT. The samples were analyzed for total solids and metals (lead, copper, zinc, iron, chromium and cadmium). Since several methods of digestion of runoff samples are given in the literature, the two most common procedures were compared. After predigestion with HNO3, the 40 samples were each separated into two aliquots. One aliquot was digested with HCl-HNO3 while the other was digested with HF-HNO3. The two digestion procedures did not provide significant differences in metal levels suggesting that the time consuming HF-HNO3 digestion procedure is not required. Significant correlations were observed between metals vs. total solids and regression equations were developed for the two parameters. The models were compared to those obtained from the earlier study. It was observed that the regression models are only similar in the case of chromium and lead vs. total solids at the two locations indicating that simple models for the two metals might be used to estimate metal loadings at different geographical areas.

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