Iceland is famous for a great number of things, but vegetation -particularly forestry- is not one of them. However, trees do exist in this country and pine stands and reasonably widespread along the coastal areas of the island, allowing the biomonitoring of compounds such as the semi-volatile organic contaminants -SVOCs-. The most common species are somewhat different from those used more frequently in these kind of studies, but offer nevertheless the same performance and possibilities. Pinus contorta, Pinus mugo, Pinus sylvestris and Pinus cembra needles were collected upon availability in 24 sampling sites that included remote and rural areas but also some urban settlements like Reykjavík or Selfoss. In seven of these sites it was possible to collect needles from more than one species, allowing a comparison between their respective uptake abilities for SVOCs. In this work the levels of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons -PAHs-, polychlorinated biphenyls -PCBs-, polybrominated diphenyl ethers -PBDEs-, organochlorine pesticides -OCPs- and musks were analysed and allowed an original description of the state-of-the-art of these compounds in this remote location.

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