Dinâmica do bário em solos que receberam baritina

Abstract

LIMA, Erica Souto Abreu. Dynamic of barium in soils treated with barite. 2011. 44p. Dissertation (Master Science in Agronomy, Soil Science) Instituto de Agronomia, Departamento de Solos, Universidade Federal Rural do Rio de Janeiro, Seropédica, RJ, 2011. Barite is the natural mineral form of barium sulfate (BaSO4), which is used in drilling fluids for oil wells exploration. Although barium sulfate is poorly soluble, and therefore, not very bioavailable to plants and with low mobility, it is not know the magnitude of changes in its dynamics under reducing soil conditions. Thus, the main objective of the study was to evaluate if under extreme reduction conditions the solubilization and release of barium in the soil would occur, increasing risk of contamination to plants and groundwater. Two experiments were conducted in parallel, one in leaching columns and the other in pots, where rice was cultivated as a test plant. In both trials soil samples from an Udox soil were used. The installation of experiments followed a completely randomized design in factorial scheme (4 x 2) with four replications, i.e., composed of control and three levels of barium (100, 300, and 3000 mg kg-1), two moisture levels (at 70% of field capacity and saturated with the maintenance of a 5 cm layer of water), totaling 32 experimental units. The redox potential (Eh), and pH values to reach the Eh of -200 mV were monitored. After reaching these values a rainfall of 200 mm day-1 was simulated in the columns, and volumes of 200 mL were collected. The extract was divided into volumes of 200 mL, corresponding to 1/8 of the soil pore volume, and they were analyzed for levels of barium and other toxic metals. The rice (Oryza sativa L.) plants in the vases remained throughout the vegetative cycle up to about 4 months, when they were harvested and analyzed. The geochemical fractionation was also performed for the elements barium, manganese and iron, by the BCR method. The results showed that the addition of doses of barite in soil, and the condition of extreme reduction led to the increase of barium, iron and manganese in the highest labile fractions. Thereby promoting higher levels of barium in the leachate extract. Under these conditions, the plants showed growth and development reduction. However, the barium may not be the main cause of this reduction, which may be linked to iron toxicity and lower absorption of zinc, phosphorus and calcium.