Toxicity of sediments and sediment pore waters from the Grand Calumet River-Indiana Harbor, Indiana area of concern.

The assessment of contaminated sediments is a difficult task due to the complex nature of the sediment matrix and the potential for exposure of aquatic organisms to in-place contaminants via several routes. Differential species sensitivity also precludes the completion of a meaningful environmental assessment with only one species. Therefore, a battery of assays approach with the Microtox assay, 48 hr Daphnia magna and Ceriodaphnia dubia tests and a 10-day Chironomous tentans test was used to evaluate the toxicity of sediment pore waters and whole sediments from the Grand Calumet River-Indiana Harbor, Indiana area of concern. All toxicity tests indicated that the test fractions (pore water, whole sediment) from each study site were toxic to the test species. A toxic units (TU) approach was used to compare measured TU from each assay with calculated TU based on chemical analyses of pore waters and whole sediments and the results of reference toxicant tests. Based on the results of these analyses, ammonia, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, metals, petroleum hydrocarbons, and bicarbonate ion appear to be the major contaminants of environmental significance to benthic invertebrates within the study area.