Title: Comprehensive index for pollution status of heavy metals in soil

Authors: Satyendra Nath` Chakrabartty

Addresses: Indian Ports Association, Indian Statistical Institute, Indian Maritime University, Flat 4B, Cleopatra, DC 258, Street No.350, Action Area 1, New Town, Kolkata, 700156, India

Abstract: Index based on model driven assessments of heavy metals (HMs) pollution of soil suffer from methodological limitations. The paper suggests an assumption-free method to get comprehensive index as geometric mean of chosen indices to reflect overall pollution status of heavy metals in soil, avoiding weights and scaling. With reduced level of substitutability among component indices, the method facilitates formation of chain indices, satisfies time-reversal test, and identifies critical areas. It produces no bias for polluted or non-polluted regions since effect of outliers is not much. It allows ranking and classification of regions and assesses paths of improvement for each region over time. It is possible to undertake statistical testing of equality of the index for two regions or one region at two time periods. Based on theoretical advantages, the proposed aggregation by GM is an improvement over the existing methods of finding overall pollution status of HMs in soils and is recommended.

Keywords: heavy metal; HM; comprehensive assessment; overall pollution status; geometric mean; chain indices; time reversal test; progress path.

DOI: 10.1504/IER.2025.150086

Interdisciplinary Environmental Review, 2025 Vol.24 No.4, pp.309 - 322

Received: 10 May 2023
Accepted: 23 Jul 2024
Published online: 28 Nov 2025 *

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