Environmental study of the marinas Part I. A study on the pollution in the marinas area

Abstract The need to control pollution and especially the heavy metals content of the sediments in the marinas area, has prompted us to carry out this work. An increase in the heavy metal concentrations in the sediments may cause severe problems to the marine environment and actions have to be taken for their decontamination. Prior to this work, the knowledge of the pollution levels is absolutely necessary. In this part of the study an attempt has been made to evaluate the extent of pollution in water and the surface sediments in the marinas of the Athens area. The results indicated that the sea water was heavily contaminated with organic pollutants which were often found to be above acceptable levels. On the contrary, the presence of nutrients was found to be normal, with the exception of phosphates, which in some locations were found in high concentrations. As far as the heavy metal content was concerned, it was found that the sediments were substantially polluted, especially with Fe, Cu, Zn and Cr. The...