Assessment of Acid Mine Drainage’s Impact on Makhat’s Watershed Plants (Taza Province, Morocco)

Abstract

The mining production industry often leaves large quantities of mine spoil heaps exposed on the surface. The lack of monitoring of these discharges could create sources of pollution; the most common among them is acid mine drainage, which causes the contamination of the environment by heavy metals present in its solutions. Bouaazza’s mine, present in Taza province North-East Morocco, was known for lead and sulfide exploitation for many years, which contributed to the exposure of important quantities of acid spoil heaps on the surface. To assess the impact caused by acid mine drainage in Makhat’s stream plants, sediments, and plant samples were collected along the stream. Physicochemical results for sediments showed pH values below 6. Geochemical results for sediments indicated Pb concentrations higher than the World Surface Rock Average standards (16 ppm), with values over 3000 ppm. As for plants, the values found after ICP-AES analyses were higher than the WHO permissible limit (2 ppm). These results confirm the harmful impact of the lack of environmental monitoring while and after abandoning mining explorations, which leads to environmental disasters.

Keywords

• pollution
• plants
• sediments
• acid mine drainage
• bouaazza’s mine
• makhat’s stream