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Investigation of Possible Contamination of Shallow Ground Water by Deeply Injected Liquid Industrial Wastes |
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| Authors: | Suzanne Lesage Richard E Jackson Mark Priddle Paul Beck Ken G Raven |
| Institution: | Suzanne Lesage is a research scientist in the Ground Water Contamination Project of the National Water Research Institute of Canada (CCIW, P.O. Box 5050, Burlington, Ontario L7R 4A6 Canada). She received a B.Sc. in biochemistry from the University of Ottawa in 1973 and a Ph.D. in chemistry from McGill University in 1977.;Richard Jackson (Intera Inc., Ste. 300, 6850 Austin Center Blvd., Austin, TX 78731) was from 1986 to 1989 chief of the Ground Water Contamination Project at the National Water Research Institute of Canada. He received a Ph.D. in contaminant hydrogeology from the University of Waterloo in 1979 and a B.S. in hydrology from the University of Arizona in 1969.;Mark Priddle was until 1990 a ground water chemist with the Ground Water Contamination Project of the National Water Research Institute of Canada (CCIW, P.O. Box 5050, Burlington, Ontario L7R 4A6 Canada). He received a B.Sc. in chemistry from the University of Waterloo in 1985. He is currently a graduate student at the University of New Brunswick.;Paul Beck was a hydrogeologist with the Ontario Ministry of the Environment until 1989. He is currently senior hydrogeologist with Intera Renting Ltd. (Intera Technologies Ltd., 265 Rimrock Rd., Unit 4, Toronto, Ontario M3J 3C6 Canada). His B.Sc. in geology was awarded by the University of Toronto in 1974 and his M.Sc. in hydrogeology, also from the University of Toronto, was granted in 1985.;Kenneth Raven is manager of the Hydrogeology Group of Intera Kenting (formerly Intera Technologies) Ltd (Ste. 600, 1525 Carting Ave., Ottawa, Ontario K1Z 8R9 Canada). He received a B.A.Sc. in geotechnical engineering from the University of Toronto in 1975 and a M.Sc. in hydrogeology from the University of Waterloo in 1980. |
| Abstract: | The objective of this study was to assess the possible impact of deep well disposal operations, conducted between 1958 and 1974, on the ground water quality in a shallow fresh water aquifer beneath Sarnia, Ontario, Canada. Because of the breakout of formation fluids in Sarnia and Port Huron, Michigan, in the early 1970s, it had been hypothesized that liquid waste from the disposal zone in bedrock had leaked through numerous abandoned oil, gas, and salt wells in the area up to the shallow fresh water aquifer and from there to the surface. A monitoring well network of 29 5cm (2 inch) diameter piezometers was established in the thin sand and shale aquifer system, which exists between 30 and 70m (100 and 230 feet) below ground surface. In addition, a 300m (1000 foot) deep borehole was drilled and instrumented with a Westbay multilevel casing, which permitted sampling of the disposal zone. Ground water samples from the shallow monitoring wells and the Westbay multilevel casing were analyzed for volatiles by GC/MS. Those volatile aromatics that were conspicuously present in the deep disposal zone, e.g., ethyl toluenes and trimethyl benzene, were not detected in the shallow monitoring wells. Thus, if contaminants from the disposal zone did indeed migrate to the shallow aquifer, contamination was not widespread and probably consisted mostly of displaced chloride-rich formation waters. |
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