Advective Flux Meter for Sediment-Water Interface
An advective flux meter system.
Approximately 10% of the sediments underlying our nation's surface water are contaminated.
Common contaminants of sediments are: nutrients, bulk organics (e.g. oil and grease),
persistent organics such as DDT, and
PCBs,
PAHs,
and metals such as mercury and arsenic.
Groundwater and surface water are interconnected; depending on the hydraulic gradient, groundwater can
discharge into, or recharge from, surface water.
In areas where groundwater discharges through the contaminated sediment into the surface water,
deposited contaminants can potentially be transported to the upper layer or
released to the water column by the processes of advection and diffusion.
As a result, benthic organisms and open-water species are either directly exposed to the contaminants
or indirectly through the contaminated food chain.
This direct or indirect exposure can cause health risks to the aquatic life and human consumers.
At sites with environmentally impacted sediment,
accurately measuring the rate of groundwater movement as it discharges through
sediment into a surface water body is necessary to assess contaminant transport,
biodegradation, and remedial measures such as subaqueous caps.
The objective of this project is to develop a dependable advective flux measuring
device that measures the flux of water at the sediment interface between surface water and groundwater,
which may lead to more effective risk assessment and management of contaminated sediments.
The figure illustrates the device evaluated in this project,
the bidirectional advective flux meter for measuring water transport across the sediment-water interface,
which has been successfully developed and tested in the field.
Contact: Bob Lien (EIMS#158146)
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