Do transient hydrological processes explain the variability of strontium-90 activity in groundwater downstream of a radioactive trench near Chernobyl?

Autor: Le Coz M; Institut de Radioprotection et de Sûreté Nucléaire (IRSN), PSE-ENV/SEDRE, 92260, Fontenay-aux-Roses, France. Electronic address: mathieu.lecoz@irsn.fr., Pannecoucke L; Institut de Radioprotection et de Sûreté Nucléaire (IRSN), PSE-ENV/SEDRE, 92260, Fontenay-aux-Roses, France; MINES ParisTech, PSL University, Centre for Geosciences and Geoengineering, 77300, Fontainebleau, France., Saintenoy A; Université Paris-Saclay, CNRS, GEOPS, 91405, Orsay, France., de Fouquet C; MINES ParisTech, PSL University, Centre for Geosciences and Geoengineering, 77300, Fontainebleau, France., Freulon X; MINES ParisTech, PSL University, Centre for Geosciences and Geoengineering, 77300, Fontainebleau, France., Cazala C; Institut de Radioprotection et de Sûreté Nucléaire (IRSN), PSE-ENV/SEDRE, 92260, Fontenay-aux-Roses, France.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: Journal of environmental radioactivity [J Environ Radioact] 2023 Apr; Vol. 259-260, pp. 107101. Date of Electronic Publication: 2023 Jan 11.
DOI: 10.1016/j.jenvrad.2022.107101
Abstrakt: The Chernobyl Pilot Site (CPS) was created in 2000 in order to study radionuclide migration processes to the geosphere from radioactive material of the Red forest buried in a trench. In this article, the data collected in the CPS up to 2015 are analyzed to identify the links between hydrological conditions and release of strontium-90 ( 90 Sr) from the trench. Then, a flow-and-transport model is used for simulating distribution of 90 Sr both in the unsaturated and saturated zones downstream of the trench. The results show that the 90 Sr activity in groundwater is strongly transient in time, due to the high inter-annual variability of both the recharge rate and the groundwater level (some particularly wet winters resulted in saturation of the bottom part of the trench). In addition, the parameters that govern the sorption of 90 Sr in trench material appear to vary significantly in space (the retardation factor ranges from 10 to 50 depending on the location). This spatiotemporal variability could hide some critical processes, e.g., related to a long-term trend, and needs to be characterized through an appropriate sampling frequency.
Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
(Copyright © 2022. Published by Elsevier Ltd.)
Databáze: MEDLINE
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