Geology and geochemical characterization of tarballs on beach along Batuburok Beach, Kuala Terengganu, Terengganu

Tarballs is common oil pollution which found in the shoreline of Eastern coast; South China Sea and Western coast; Selat Malacca.Oil pollution is considered to be one of the main contributors to marine pollution. Besides that, the threat that oil pollution poses to the marine environment is extremely dangerous to its ecosystem. The South China Sea is one of the important route for several activities such as fisheries, recreational and marine and also oil and gas exploration. Batu Burok beach in Kuala Terengganu which located facing the South China Sea also poses the same oil pollution which is tarballs. The tarballs which stranded on Batu Burok beach are further analyzed by using EDXRF spectrometry as to investigate the distribution of heavy metals in it and to determine the relationship of the heavy metals concentration with standards parameter. Besides that, Kuala Terengganu consists of four lithologies which are metasiltstone, shale, siltstone and tuff as for the geological finding and geological map with the scale of 1:25,000 of Kuala Terengganu is then updated. There are 10 distribution of heavy metals that found In tarballs which are aluminium (Al), potassium (K), iron (Fe), magnesium (Mg), barium (Ba), zirconium (Zr), antimony (Sb), titanium (Ti), tin (Sn) and manganese(Mn). Among all the distribution of heavy metals that found in tarballs, only Ba and Mn are the common heavy metals which found in tarballs and also classified as poisonous or carcinogen to human and environment. Based on the concentration comparison of Ba and Mn with standards parameter provided by ACGIH(IDLH) and NIOSH(IDLH), the
tarballs which stranded on Batu Burok beach are not poisonous as the concentration of Ba and Mn does not exceeds the standards limit which not give effect on human health and environment.