Isah Haruna

Trace Elements Evaluation for some mine ponds in the Tin Mining Areas of Jos amd Environs, Plateau State, Nigeria Isah Haruna

Research Paper from the year 2012 in the subject Geography / Earth Science - Geology, Mineralogy, Soil Science, grade: -, Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University (School of Science), course: Environmental Geology, language: English, comment: This research paper attempts to evaluate the impacts of trace elements release to the environment through the Tin mining activities. The former mining ponds are now used for agriculture, fish farm and source of water for domestic use in most towns and villages around the mining areas. This necessitates the trace elements evaluation to mitigate possible health hazards. Scientific approach chosen for this studies are the Remote Sensing/ GIS and the statistical evaluation. The results gave an idea of some trace elements that should be monitored and taken care of in order to sanitized the ponds , abstract: The study area ("Derelict Land") in Plateau State fall within Y coordinates 1039185m to 1114995m and X coordinates 452385m to 514845m on the Nigeria's LANDSAT MSS 2001. The approximate area covered by the project is about 3178.1km22 from the satellite image measurements. Six mining areas were involved ( Jos-Bukuru, Rayfield, Sabongidan kanar, Bisichi, Kuru ? and Barikin Ladi) in this research. Analysis of land use changes confirmed that mining is rapidly claiming most of land. Preliminary application of Remote Sensing and Geographical Information System (GIS) to study satellite image of the mining areas is an attempt to evaluate and characterize the mining areas based on the spectral signatures of mine ponds, inactive abandoned mine dumps and structural pattern of the areas. The analysis of variance of the average trace element concentration from the six mining localities showed that Iron (Fe) is the only trace element that show universal anomaly in all the mining localities compared to WHO (2002) Standards for drinking (0.30ppm). Iron (Fe) anomaly range from 0.39-2.54ppm. Besides Iron (Fe), each mining locality has its unique trace e