Heavy Metal Contamination of the Turag River Sediment, Bangladesh

The environment of Bangladesh is being degraded day by day with the weight of over crowd people. Untreated and poorly treated effluents are severely polluting the water courses of Bangladesh. One of such example is the Turag River. In this study concentration of five heavy metals (Pb, Cd, Cr, Cu, and Zn) for sediment from Turag River and for the portion of sediment which passing through the #200 sieve were determined to evaluate their levels and spatial distribution. To assess metal contamination in sediment, US environmental Protection Agency's (USEPA) guidelines were applied. The concentration of Zn, Cr in sediment sample is fall in the criteria of moderately polluted range. Pb, Cd is not in polluted range, on the other hand Cu is highly polluted. It is shown in this study that standard deviation between the concentrations of metals at different sites is not significant that may indicate the spatial distribution of metal contamination is almost uniform. The metals contaminations in sediment are also evaluated by applying Index of geo-accumulation (Igeo), contamination factor (CF) and toxicity characteristics leaching procedure test (TCLP).