Impact assessment of anthropogenic activities on the ecological systems in the Xiongan New Area in the North China Plain

The aim of this study is to assess the impact of anthropogenic activities on the ecological systems in the Xiongan New Area (XNA), China. Artificial sweeteners (ASs) were used as anthropogenic tracers to investigate how anthropogenic activities affect water, soil, and plant layers. For this purpose, the concentrations of 4 typical ASs, acesulfame (ACE), sucralose (SUC), saccharin (SAC), and cyclamate (CYC) were measured in water, soil, and plant layers. Moreover, a tracer test was conducted in the critical zone observatory (CZO) in the southern part of the study area to investigate the migration path and time of anthropogenic activities on the ecological systems. Acesulfame, SUC, SAC, and CYC were widely detected in all of the sample types, and their average values were 0.22, 0.53, 0.06, and 0.08 µg/L in the water layer; 0.04, 0.18, 0.06, and 0.06 µg/kg in the soil layer; and 1.79, 0.11, 4.42, and 0.95 µg/kg in the plant layer, respectively. The tracer test showed that 1.1% to 1.8% of the impacts of the anthropogenic activities migrated from the surface to the shallow aquifer within 13 d, 6% to 19% migrated to the maize layer within 28 d, and 79% to 93% were adsorbed and biodegraded in the soil layer. Therefore, the scope and strength of the influence of the anthropogenic activities on the environmental media exhibit a decreasing sequence of maize > water > soil. This study not only quantitatively characterizes the impact of anthropogenic activities on the ecological environment but also presents the first comprehensive overview of the environmental fate of ASs in the critical zone of the XNA, China. Integr Environ Assess Manag 2021;17:866-876. © 2021 SETAC.