Air pollution records from urban lake sediments: the implications of datable, lacustrine sedimentary archives for epidemiology

• Published in: AIR POLLUTION XIV Vol. 86; pp. 735 - 744
• Main Authors: WORSLEY, A. T, POWER, A. L, BOOTH, C. A, RICHARDSON, N, APPLEBY, P. G, ORTON, C
• Format: Conference Proceeding
• Language: English
• Published: Southampton WIT 01.01.2006
• Subjects: Applied sciences; Atmospheric pollution; Exact sciences and technology; Pollution; United Kingdom; Europe; British Isles, England; Radioactive pollution; Age estimation; Magnetic monitoring; Historical aspects; Lead 210; Iron; Urban area; Radioisotope; Lake sediments; Epidemiology; Heavy metal; Trace element; Health and environment; Surface water; Lakes; Air pollution; Public health; Anthropogenic factor
• ISBN: 1845641655; 9781845641658
• ISSN: 1746-448X
• DOI: 10.2495/AIR06073

Sediment pollution records from several small, urban, man-made lakes from Merseyside and Halton (N.W. England, UK) are presented. They demonstrate that lake sediments can be used to reconstruct atmospheric pollution histories that encompass the entire Industrial Revolution (the last 250 years) in the U.K. Regionally, this was a period that saw the instigation, development and subsequent expansion of major industrial activity, such as iron and steel production, petro-chemical manufacture and power generation, followed by rises in road and air travel. Through the use of analytical techniques, such as environmental magnetism, together with super(210)Pb dating, urban lacustrine stratigraphic records illustrate that the types and levels of atmospheric pollution have changed temporally. The work promotes the ethos that such archives could be vital to our understanding of past, present and future relationships between human health and the environment.