7092

• UCREFRP Catalog Number: 7092
• Author: Eisler, R.
• Title: Arsenic Hazards to Fish, Wildlife, and Invertebrates
• USFW Year: 1988.
• USFW - Doc Type: A Synoptic Review.
• Copyright Material: NO

The major uses of arsenic are in the production of herbicides,
insecticides, desiccants, wood preservatives, and growth stimulants for plants
and animals. Much smaller amounts are used in the manufacture of glass
(nearly all of which contains 0.2% to 1.0% arsenic as an additive--primarily
as a decolorizing agent) and textiles, and in medical and veterinary
applications (NAS 1977; EPA 1980). Arsenic is also an ingredient in lewisite,
a blistering poison gas developed (but not used) during World War I, and in
various police riot control agents (NAS 1977). The availability of arsenic in
certain local areas has been increased by various human activities: smelting
and refining of gold, silver, copper, zinc, uranium, and lead ores; combustion
of fossil fuels, such as coal and gasoline; burning of vegetation from cotton
gins treated with arsenical pesticides; careless or extensive use of arsenical
herbicides, pesticides, and defoliants; dumping of land wastes and sewage
sludge (1.1 mg/1) in areas that allow leaching into groundwater; use of
domestic detergents in wash water (2.5 to 1,000 mg As/1); manufacture of
glass; and by the sinking of drinking water wells into naturally arseniferous
rock (NRCC 1978; EPA 1980). There are several major anthropogenic'sources of
environmental arsenic contamination: industrial smelters--the effluent from a
copper smelter in Tacoma, Washington, contained up to 70 tons of arsenic
discharged yearly into nearby Puget Sound (NRCC 1978); coal-fired power
plants, which collectively emit about 3,000 tons of arsenic annually in the
United States (EPA 1980); and production and use of arsenical pesticides,
coupled with careless disposal of used pesticide containers (NAS 1977).
Elevated levels of arsenic have been reported in soils near smelters, in acid
mine spoils, and in orchards receiving heavy applications of lead arsenate
(NAS 1977; Dudas 1984). Air concentrations of arsenic are elevated near metal
smelters, near sources of coal burning, and wherever arsenical pesticides are
applied (NAS 1977). Atmospheric deposition of arsenic has steadily increased
for at least 30 years, as judged by sedimentary evidence from lakes in upstate
New York (Smith et al. 1987). Arsenic is introduced into the aquatic
environment through atmospheric deposition of combustion products and through
runoff from fly-ash storage areas near power plants and nonferrous smelters
(Smith et al. 1987). Elevated arsenic concentrations in water were recorded
near mining operations, and from mineral springs and other natural
waters--usually alkaline and with high sodium and bicarbonate contents (NAS
1977). In the United States, the most widespread and frequent increases in
dissolved arsenic concentrations in river waters were in the northern Midwest;
all evidence suggests that increased atmospheric deposition of fossil fuel
combustion products was the predominant cause of the trend (Smith et al.
1987).
Agricultural applications provide the largest anthropogenic source of
arsenic in the environment (Woolson 1975). Inorganic arsenicals (arsenic
trioxide; arsenic acid; arsenates of calcium, copper, lead, and sodium; and
arsenites of sodium and potassium) have been used widely for centuries as
insecticides, herbicides, algicides, and desiccants. Paris green (cuprous
arsenite) was successfully used in 1867 to control the Colorado potato beetle
(Leptinotarsa decemlineata) in the eastern United States. Arsenic trioxide
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