Determination of Pb,As, Cd and trace elements in polluted soils near a lead–zinc mine using polarized X‐ray fluorescence spectrometry and the characteristics of the elemental distribution in the area

Polarization energy dispersive X‐ray fluorescence spectrometry was used in the determination of Pb, As and Cd, as well as Cr, Cu, Zn, Ni and other minor and trace elements in the soil samples taken from a polluted area by lead mine exploitation. Two difficulties have to be overcome. One is strong overlap of Pb Lα over As Kα and another is lack of suitable certified reference materials. The different excitation conditions and analytical lines were tried to reduce the impact of overlap of Pb Lα over As Kα. When KBr was used as the second target, compared with Zr, the proportion from Pb Lα was reduced about six times. Even so, however, the overlap was not reduced enough to be ignored. The inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry and mass spectrometry methods were used to analyze parts of soil samples and provide data for compensating lack of reference materials. By this method, the analytical concentration range of Pb, As and Cd were significantly extended. The analytical range of Pb, As and Cd were 1.4 µg/g~4.2%, 0.6 µg/g~9.3% and 0.5 µg/g~1500 µg/g, respectively. The high concentrations of Pb, As and Cd were found in the samples in the vicinity of the Pb‐Zn mine. The concentrations of Pb, As, Cd, Zn and Cu were higher than the Class III in the Chinese environmental quality standard for soils. The highest concentrations of Pb, As, Cd and Zn in the soil samples were 14 960, 2726, 65 and 9439 µg/g, respectively. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.