PREVENTION OF MARINE SEDIMENT POLLUTION–TAKING HEAVY METALS AS EXAMPLES

The danger of heavy metal pollution is increasing due to the increase in discharges of industrial waste into water bodies, as the results of rapid development of the industrial sectors in recent years. The heavy metals of mercury, arsenic, chromium may cause diseases of nervous system and cancers and thus are harmful to human health and other organisms. As a type of major marine pollutants, heavy metals are easy to be absorbed by marine organisms and to convert to more toxic metal organic compounds, and then to pass through the food chain to endanger human health. Marine sediments are the main destination of land source toxic heavy metals. This paper mainly deals with the mechanisms of heavy metals absorption in sediment as well as their background values and quality benchmarks. On the basis, countermeasures for water pollution prevention are suggested.