Soil health assessment of dressing and smelting slag field based on heavy metal pollution-buffer-fertility three aspects

The soil health of heavy metals in dressing and smelting slag field varies soil physicochemical properties. This study proposed a new soil health index based on heavy metal pollution-buffer-fertility for dressing and smelting slag field. Consequently, spatial distribution of soil physicochemical properties and heavy metals were varied, and correlated to each other. Soil buffer function and fertility played a much more important role in soil health in the dressing and smelting slag field located in Gejiu city, which can result in that soil health indexes were higher than those in Huili county, although the soil heavy metal pollution in the former was severer than that in the latter. Maximum values of soil health indexes for dressing and smelting slag field in Gejiu city were 3.84, 0.61, and 1.75 corresponding to additive, multiplicative, and maximum value composite methods, which were higher than those in Huili county with 2.25, 0.61, and 0.17. The former’s high value is concentrated in southeastern regions and low value in some western areas, the latter’s high value occurred in southeastern districts and low value in northwestern places. So this study unveils a novel perspective on the soil health consequences associated with soil heavy metal pollution-buffer-fertility three aspects.