Relevant environmental aspects regarding the highlighting of anthropogenic pressures and the geochemical evaluation of the protected areas

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to assess the quality of soil and water environmental factors in some protected areas in Romania both to establish geochemical threshold values and to highlight anthropogenic pressures where they have been identified. The activities carried out are defined spatially and temporally so that the results obtained include seasonal variations and other influencing factors that have variability on a temporal and spatial scale. Each protected area introduced in the study was well documented, and the particularities, the essential characteristics, the influencing factors, and those that can influence the quality of the environmental factors were presented. The developed conceptual model integrated all these elements for a better knowledge of the study areas. The experiments aimed at taking soil and water samples from each analyzed site, then these samples were subjected to laboratory tests that included twenty parameters/quality indicators analyzed for each sample, and the values obtained were compared with those in the legislation in force. In the areas under the influence of anthropogenic activities, aspects of detail were highlighted, which mainly reveal a degradation of environmental factors. A general conclusion is related to the variability of the quality of environmental factors from one protected area to another, depending on the specifics, geological, geomorphological dowry, but also as a result of the manifestation of anthropogenic pressures.