Tampa Bay and Galveston Bay sediment cores Environmental trends of contaminats from the Mississippi River Delta

Amidst uncertainties caused by the complex history of sediment transport in coastal areas, radionuclide geochronology allowed a consistent historical reconstruction of the historical evolution of trace contaminant inputs into the Mississippi River Delta, Galveston Bay, and Tampa Bay. The areas received contaminants from a drainage basin, which contains > 50% of the chemical and refinery capacity of the US. Low concentrations of trace metals and trace organic contaminants were encountered at these sites. Fluxes and concentrations of most contaminants were within the range reported for relatively uncontaminated Gulf of Mexico sediments. The pollutant profiles indicate that present-day situation is continuing to improve from the more contaminated conditions in the 1950-1970s. Management strategies to ban the use of organochlorine contaminants have resulted in declining concentrations. This is an abstract of a paper presented at the 221st ACS National Meeting (San Diego, CA 4/1-5/2001).

Environmental trends of contaminats from the Mississippi River Delta, Tampa Bay and Galveston Bay sediment cores Conference Paper