Global pollution shown by lead and cadmium contents in precipitation of polar regions and Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau

The analysis of the major ions, lead and cadmium has been performed for snow-pit samples collected from the Arctic, the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau and the Antarctic Ice Sheet. These snow pits were excavated respectively from the snowpack in Canadian Northwest Territory (NWT) and the central Arctic, three glaciers on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau and surface snow along the route of the International Trans-Antarctic Expedition (ITAE). The source regions for the lead pollution of central Arctic have been identified by analyzing of stable lead isotopic ratios, meteorological and atmospheric chemistry studies. It shows that the central Arctic is still under intensive lead input, despite the fact that lead content in Greenland Ice Sheet displays a rapid decreasing since the 1970s due to US and some European countries’ campaigns to reduce lead-containing gasoline-additives. This is because there are multiple lead sources for the central Arctic, including the countries that have not performed gasoline-additives reducing. The backgrounds of atmospheric aerosol compositions, as well as the concentrations of lead and cadmium in precipitation of the early 1990s, are contrasted among the Arctic, Antarctica and Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau. The measured lead content in the snowfall at the typical sites of the three regions is divided into natural (background) and anthropogenic components. It is found that natural lead concentration (mainly crustal and/or sea-salt lead) is roughly equal among the three regions (< 3×10¹²g · g¹). However, the percentage of the natural lead to the measured lead is negligible in precipitation in the central Arctic and the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, while it is considerable in Antarctic precipitation. The anthropogenic component of lead (>50% in Antarctic precipitation, >97% in the Arctic and the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau ) is mainly responsible for the lead input to both polar regions and to the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau. Lead pollution may have spread into the whole troposphere and the most remote regions on earth.