Environmental risk evaluation for radionuclide transport through natural barriers of nuclear waste disposal with multi-scale streamline approaches.

Autor: Wang Z; College of Construction Engineering, Jilin University, Changchun, China; Institute of Intelligent Simulation and Early Warning for Subsurface Environment, Jilin University, Changchun, China., Jia S; School of Resources and Safety Engineering, Chongqing University, Chongqing, China. Electronic address: jiasd19@mails.jlu.edu.cn., Dai Z; College of Construction Engineering, Jilin University, Changchun, China; Institute of Intelligent Simulation and Early Warning for Subsurface Environment, Jilin University, Changchun, China; School of Environmental and Municipal Engineering, Qingdao University of Technology, Qingdao, China. Electronic address: dzx@jlu.edu.cn., Yin S; Hebei State Key Laboratory of Mine Disaster Prevention, North China Institute of Science and Technology, Beijing, Yanjiao, China., Zhang X; College of Construction Engineering, Jilin University, Changchun, China; Institute of Intelligent Simulation and Early Warning for Subsurface Environment, Jilin University, Changchun, China., Yang Z; School of Environmental and Municipal Engineering, Qingdao University of Technology, Qingdao, China., Thanh HV; Laboratory for Computational Mechanics, Institute for Computational Science and Artificial Intelligence, Van Lang University, Ho Chi Minh City, Viet Nam; MEU Research Unit, Middle East University, Amman, Jordan., Ling H; CNNC Key Laboratory on Geological Disposal of High-level Radioactive Waste, Beijing Research Institute of Uranium Geology, Beijing, China., Soltanian MR; Departments of Geosciences and Environmental Engineering, University of Cincinnati, OH, USA.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: The Science of the total environment [Sci Total Environ] 2024 Nov 25; Vol. 953, pp. 176084. Date of Electronic Publication: 2024 Sep 07.
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2024.176084
Abstrakt: Natural barriers, encompassing stable geological formations that serve as the final bastion against radionuclide transport, are paramount in mitigating the long-term contamination risks associated with the nuclear waste disposal. Therefore, it is important to simulate and predict the processes and spatial-temporal distributions of radionuclide transport within these barriers. However, accurately predicting radionuclide transport on the field scale is challenging due to uncertainties associated with parameter scaling. This study develops an integrated evaluation framework that combines upscaled parameters, streamline transport models, and response surface techniques to systematically assess environmental risk metrics and parameter uncertainties across different scales. Initially, upscaling methods are established to estimate the prior interval of critical transport parameters at the field scale, and streamline models are derived by considering the radionuclides transport with a variety of physicochemical mechanisms and geological characterizations in natural barriers. To assess uncertainty ranges of the risk metrics related to upscaled parameters, uncertainty quantification is performed on the ground of 5000 Monte Carlo simulations. The results indicate that the upscaled dispersivity of fractured media (α L f ) has a relatively high sensitivity ranking on release dose for all nuclides, and upscaled matrix sorption coefficient (K d ) of Pu-242 strongly affects breakthrough time and release dose of Pu-242. Facilitated by robust response surface with the lowest R 2 of 0.89, it is shown that the release doses of Pu-242 and Pb-210 increase under conditions of low K d and α L f , respectively. Furthermore, statistical analysis reveals that employing limited laboratory-scale parameters results in narrower confidence intervals for risk metrics, while upscaling methods better account for the highly heterogeneous properties of large-scale field conditions. The developed risk evaluation framework provides valuable insights for utilizing upscaled parameters and modeling radionuclide transport within natural barriers under various scenarios.
Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest regarding the publication of this article.
(Copyright © 2024 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)
Databáze: MEDLINE
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