Dioxin and PCB contamination around a heavy industrial area: A case history

An extended investigation carried out after the discovery of excess occurrence of dioxins and PCB in sheep and goat freely grazing around Europe's largest integrated iron and steel (I&S) factory in Taranto industrial area revealed an ubiquitous recent (by dioxins) and historic (by PCB) contamination. Experimental results, including fingerprint and PCA comparison, excluded single-point emission by the I&S factory as well as by other nearby industrial chimneys, pointing out to fugitive diffuse emission escaping from the I&S sinter plant as the contamination source. The occurrence of two routes of environment contamination and their overlapping toxicity effects through the food chain were demonstrated, due primarily to such diffuse emission and secondarily to PCB present in top soil around the industrial area.

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