ABSTRACT
Sediment pollution is a global issue that threatens environmental sustainability and human
health. Coastal marine environments, particularly harbours, are potential hot-spots of sediment
pollution, as they are bound to receive considerable amounts of chemical contaminants from
intense maritime and other anthropogenic activities such as industrialisation, agriculture and
urbanisation (Smith et al., 2009; Petrosillo et al., 2009; Lepland et al., 2010; Mestres et al.,
2010; Schipper et al., 2010; Romero et al., 2014). Moreover, water exchanges within coastal
harbours can result in the influx of large amounts of suspended sediments, which settle and
accumulate within harbour basins under low hydrodynamic conditions (Lepland et al., 2010;
Luo et al., 2010; Mestres et al., 2010). These sediments may derive from varied sources, but
are mainly supplied by riverine discharges. Globally, the discharge of sediments by rivers is
estimated at 2.3 billion tonnes per year (Syvitski et al., 2005). In Ghana, rivers discharge
about 2.4 million tonnes of sediment per year into the sea (Akrasi, 2011). Since sediments
play an important role in the fate of chemical pollutants in aquatic systems (Mulligan et al.,
2001; Ruiz-Fernandez et al 2009; Prato et al., 2011; Jiang et al., 2013), the accumulation of
sediments in harbour basins can result in the accumulation of chemical pollutants.
