Coastal area surrounding the river Ibar, in the area between cities of
Kosovska Mitrovica and Leposavic in the north of Kosovo and Metohija, is
occupied with seven industrial waste dumps. These dumps were all part of the
exploitation and flotation refinement of raw mineral materials, metallurgic
refinement of concentrates, chemical industry, industrial refinement and
energetic facilities of Trepca industrial complex. The existing waste dumps,
both active and inactive, are of heterogenic chemical composition. Its impact
on the river water is shown by the content of heavy metals found in it.
Removal of lead, cadmium and zinc would be economically unrewarding,
regardless of the technology used. Wooden plant that prevails in this area is
white willow. This work is focused on the removal of heavy metals (Pb, Cd and
Zn) from the water of the river Ibar using white willow. Roots of the willow
are cultivated using the method of water cultures in an individual solution
of heavy metals and river water sample. The preparation of the samples for
analysis was performed by burning the herbal material and dissolving ashes in
the appropriate acids. The concentrations of metals were determined by the
stripping analysis. In the investigated heavy metal solutions the biomass
increase is 25.6% in lead solution, 27.3% in cadmium and 30.7% in zinc
solution. The increase of biomass in nutritional solution, without the heavy
metals, is 32.4% and in river water sample 27.5%. The coefficient of
bioaccumulation in solutions with heavy metals is 1.6% in lead solution, 1.9%
in cadmium and 2.2% in zinc solution. Heavy metals accumulation is 18.74 ?g
of lead, 20.09 ?g of cadmium and 22.89 ?g of zinc. The coefficient of
bioaccumulation of the water samples, that contained 44.83 ?g/dm3 of lead,
29.21 ?g/dm3 of cadmium and 434.00 ?g/dm3 of zinc, during the period of 45
days, was 30.3% for lead, 53.4% for cadmium and 3.9% for zinc. The
concentrations of accumulated metals from the river water are 19.01 ?g of
lead, 21.85 ?g of cadmium and 23.96 ?g of zinc in grams dry matter. The
obtained results indicate that the willow can contribute to the
decontamination of moderately contaminated river water from Pb, Cd and Zn.