Abstract

Cadmium (Cd) is a toxic metal, which is taken up by plants relatively easily. In Sweden, high Cd levels in soils and crops are encountered in agricultural areas where the soil parent material is rich in the metal. Farmers must produce grain with a Cd concentration below permissible limits, and the milling and food industry rates traceability as increasingly important. In this study, both airborne and proximal gamma ray sensing were tested in an area where high levels of Cd in soils and crops have been recorded. The hypothesis was that the occurrence of Cd in the topsoil and winter wheat grain would follow the variation of U-238 so that gamma ray sensing could thereby be used as a fast and cheap method for monitoring Cd in soils and crops. We found that the variability of Cd in the topsoil was considerable in the area and was very well correlated with U-238. It seems possible to delineate areas of winter wheat that have a very low risk of high Cd. A working model for the practical application of the sensing technique is suggested.

Keywords

Radioactivity; Geochemistry; Wheat; Cadmium; Uranium; Sweden; Risk classification

Published in

Title: Proximal Soil Sensing
ISBN: 978-90-481-8858-1, eISBN: 978-90-481-8859-8
Publisher: Springer

Conference

1st Global Workshop on High Resolution Digital Soil Sensing and Mapping, 2008, Sydney, AUSTRALIA

SLU Authors

• Söderström, Mats

  • Department of Soil and Environment, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

• Eriksson, Jan

  • Department of Soil and Environment, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

UKÄ Subject classification

Soil Science


Publication identifier

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-8859-8_28

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/118175