Accumulation of heavy metal in soil and plant irrigated with garbage landfill leachate

Two adjacent sites of Li Keng landfill, Guangzhou City, one having been irrigated with leachate for two years and the adjacent site having not received leachate, were surveyed to assess the accumulation of heavy metals (Cu, Zn, Pb and Cd) in soil and in plant after landfill leachate irrigation. Furthermore, the differences of three main plants, Eleusine indica, Paspalum thunbergii and Cyndon dactylon, dominated the two sites, in the above heavy metal contents between occurred on leachate irrigated site and leachate unirrigated site were analyzed comparatively. The results showed that all heavy metal measured displayed evident accumulation throughout profile at 0.05 level except Zn, evident accumulation for Zn only occurred in 0-20 cm upper layer, the accumulation of heavy metals in irrigated soil decreased with depth. Plants sampled from the leachate-irrigated site had higher contents of heavy metals than that sampled from site not receiving leachate. But the difference in heavy content in plant was not signi