Comment on: "A novel approach to peatlands as archives of total cumulative spatial pollution loads from atmospheric deposition of airborne elements complementary to EMEP data: Priority pollutants (Pb, Cd, Hg)" by Ewa Miszczak, Sebastian Stefaniak, Adam Michczyński, Eiliv Steinnes and Irena Twardowska

F De Vleeschouwer; S Baron; J M Cloy; M Enrico; V Ettler; N Fagel; H Kempter; M Kylander; C Li; J Longman; A Martinez-Cortizas; S Marx; N Mattielli; T Mighall; T M Nieminen; N Piotrowska; X Pontevedra-Pombal; S Pratte; V Renson; W Shotyk; E Shuttleworth; J Sikorski; N Stromsoe; J Talbot; C von Scheffer; D Weiss; C Zaccone; G Le Roux

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.138699

Comment on: "A novel approach to peatlands as archives of total cumulative spatial pollution loads from atmospheric deposition of airborne elements complementary to EMEP data: Priority pollutants (Pb, Cd, Hg)" by Ewa Miszczak, Sebastian Stefaniak, Adam Michczyński, Eiliv Steinnes and Irena Twardowska

Sci Total Environ. 2020 Oct 1:737:138699. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.138699. Epub 2020 Apr 15.

Authors

F De Vleeschouwer¹, S Baron², J M Cloy³, M Enrico⁴, V Ettler⁵, N Fagel⁶, H Kempter⁷, M Kylander⁸, C Li⁹, J Longman¹⁰, A Martinez-Cortizas¹¹, S Marx¹², N Mattielli¹³, T Mighall¹⁴, T M Nieminen¹⁵, N Piotrowska¹⁶, X Pontevedra-Pombal¹¹, S Pratte¹⁷, V Renson¹⁸, W Shotyk¹⁹, E Shuttleworth²⁰, J Sikorski¹⁶, N Stromsoe²¹, J Talbot²², C von Scheffer²³, D Weiss²⁴, C Zaccone²⁵, G Le Roux²⁶

Affiliations

¹ Instituto Franco-Argentino para el Estudio del Clima y sus Impactos (UMI IFAECI/CNRS-CONICET-UBA-IRD), Argentina. Electronic address: [email protected].
² Laboratoire TRACES (CNRS, Université de Toulouse), France.
³ Scotland's Rural College, Edinburgh, UK.
⁴ Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Science, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA.
⁵ Charles University, Faculty of Science, Prague, Czech Republic.
⁶ AGEs, Département de Géologie, Université de Liège, Belgium.
⁷ Welzheimer Str. 14, D-71566 Althuette, Germany.
⁸ Department of Geological Sciences and the Bolin Centre for Climate Research, Stockholm University, Sweden.
⁹ Geoscience Environnement Toulouse (CNRS-UPS-IRD-CNAP-CNES), France.
¹⁰ School of Geography and the Environment, University of Oxford, UK.
¹¹ EcoPast (GI-1553), Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, Spain.
¹² GeoQuEST Research Centre, School of Earth, Atmospheric and Life Sciences, University of Wollongong, Australia.
¹³ Laboratoire G-Time, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium.
¹⁴ School of Geosciences, University of Aberdeen, UK.
¹⁵ Natural Resources Institute Finland Luke, Helsinki, Finland.
¹⁶ Silesian University of Technology, Institute of Physics-CSE, GADAM Center, Gliwice, Poland.
¹⁷ Department of Geography, School of Earth Sciences, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China.
¹⁸ Research Reactor, University of Missouri, USA.
¹⁹ Department of Renewable Resources, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada.
²⁰ Department of Geography, University of Manchester, UK.
²¹ College of Engineering, IT and Environment, Charles Darwin University, Australia.
²² Département de Géographie, Université de Montréal, Canada.
²³ Institute for Ecosystem Research, Kiel University, Germany.
²⁴ Imperial College London, UK; Princeton University, Princeton, USA.
²⁵ Department of Biotechnology, University of Verona, Italy.
²⁶ Laboratoire Ecologie Fonctionnelle et Environnement, Université de Toulouse, CNRS, Toulouse, France.

PMID: 32376094
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.138699

Abstract

A recent paper by Miszczak et al. (2020) examines metal contamination of mires in Poland and Norway. The authors conclude that lead (Pb) records in ombrotrophic peatlands cannot be used to reconstruct the chronological history of anthropogenic activities due to post-depositional mobility of the metal. We contest this general conclusion which stands in contrast with a significant body of literature demonstrating that Pb is largely immobile in the vast majority of ombrotrophic peatlands. Our aim is to reaffirm the crucial contribution that peat records have made to our knowledge of atmospheric Pb contamination. In addition, we reiterate the necessity of following established protocols to produce reliable records of anthropogenic Pb contamination in environmental archives.

Keywords: Bog; Enrichment factor; Geochemistry; Immobility; Lead; Metal accumulation rate; Ombrotrophic peatland.

Publication types

Letter