Radionuclide Transport Behavior in a Generic Geological Radioactive Waste Repository

We performed numerical simulations of groundwater flow and radionuclide transport to study the influence of several factors, including the ambient hydraulic gradient, groundwater pressure anomalies, and the properties of the excavation damaged zone (EDZ), on the prevailing transport mechanism (i.e., advection or molecular diffusion) in a generic nuclear waste repository within a clay‐rich geological formation. By comparing simulation results, we show that the EDZ plays a major role as a preferential flowpath for radionuclide transport. When the EDZ is not taken into account, transport is dominated by molecular diffusion in almost the totality of the simulated domain, and transport velocity is about 40% slower. Modeling results also show that a reduction in hydraulic gradient leads to a greater predominance of diffusive transport, slowing down radionuclide transport by about 30% with respect to a scenario assuming a unit gradient. In addition, inward flow caused by negative pressure anomalies in the clay‐rich formation further reduces transport velocity, enhancing the ability of the geological barrier to contain the radioactive waste. On the other hand, local high gradients associated with positive pressure anomalies can speed up radionuclide transport with respect to steady‐state flow systems having the same regional hydraulic gradients. Transport behavior was also found to be sensitive to both geometrical and hydrogeological parameters of the EDZ. Results from this work can provide useful knowledge toward correctly assessing the post‐closure safety of a geological disposal system.     

Framing the use of geo-information in government: a tale of two perspectives

While commercial virtual globes (e.g. Google Earth) and global scientific cyber-infrastructures (e.g. Digital Earth) are revolutionizing the way we use and produce geo-information, we still lack a rich conceptual understanding of how genuine human actors use geo-information and associated technologies in real work settings. In this paper, we conceptualize the use of geo-information as encompassing people’s actual use practices, the values to which people aspire through geo-information use, and the rules that either legally prescribe or just encourage optimal use. Values, practices and rules can be illuminated from two perspectives (or lenses), the market and the polis, resulting in radically different insights on the use of geo-information as a social phenomenon. We argue that with a polis lens we stand a chance to explain how authentic human actors, groups and communities with different values, interests and motivations use geo-information, and how societal benefits materialize or not as a result. Seen from a polis lens, values are not easily measurable standards of goodness, dominant public management ideas can be the source of technical-organizational change in government while policies can be fruitfully examined as persuasive arguments to target audiences. With a polis lens, we are more likely to understand the emergence of new practices, value contests and global rules underpinning commercial virtual globes and scientific cyber-infrastructures.     

Retrogressive fabric development during exhumation of the Voltri Massif (Ligurian Alps,Italy): arguments for an extensional origin and implications for the Alps–Apennines linkage

Geological mapping coupled with structural investigations carried out in the Voltri Massif (eastern Ligurian Alps, Italy) provide new data for the interpretation of the tectonic context controlling main fabric development during exhumation of its high-pressure core. The Voltri Massif is here interpreted as a c. 30 km-long eclogite-bearing, asymmetric dome formed by the progressive verticalisation of the regional, second-phase mylonitic foliation developed during retrogressive greenschist metamorphic conditions. In this light, the exhumation history is driven by a ductile-to-brittle extensional process, operating through low-angle, top-to-the-W multiple detachment systems. A Late Eocene–Early Oligocene age for this extensional episode is proposed on the basis of structural correlations, stratigraphic and radiometric constraints. In this scenario, the Voltri Massif is interpreted as an extensional domain developed to accommodate the Late Eocene–Early Oligocene arching of the Western Alps–Northern Apennines orogenic system.     

Scenarios of Earthquake-Generated Tsunamis for the Italian Coast of the Adriatic Sea

We calculated the expected impact on the Italian coast of the Adriatic Sea of a large set of tsunamis resulting from potential earthquakes generated by major fault zones. Our approach merges updated knowledge on the regional tectonics and scenario-like calculations of expected tsunami impact. We selected six elongated potential source zones. For each of them we determined a Maximum Credible Earthquake and the associated Typical Fault, described by its size, geometry and kinematics. We then let the Typical Fault float along strike of its parent source zone and simulated all tsunamis it could generate. Simulations are based on the solution of the nonlinear shallow water equations through a finite-difference technique. For each run we calculated the wavefields at specified simulation times and the maximum water height field (above mean sea level), then generated travel-time maps and maximum water height profiles along the target coastline. Maxima were also classified in a three-level code of expected tsunami threat. We found that the southern portion of Apulia facing Albania and the Gargano promontory are especially prone to the tsunami threat. We also found that some bathymetric features are crucial in determining the focalization-defocalization of tsunami energy. We suggest that our results be taken into account in the design of early-warning strategies.     

Microbial food web contributions to bottom water hypoxia in the northern Gulf of Mexico

Nutrients from the Mississippi/Atchafalaya Rivers greatly stimulate biological production in the ‘classical’ food web on the inner shelf of the northern Gulf of Mexico. Portions of this production, especially large diatoms and zooplankton fecal pellets, sink and decompose in the bottom water, consuming oxygen and contributing to the annual development of an extensive zone of bottom water hypoxia, typically >15,000 km² since 1993. The microbial food web is also active in the Mississippi River plume, but consists of small organisms that sink slowly. This ‘recycling’ food web has not been considered as a significant contributor to vertical flux and hypoxia. However, gelatinous zooplankton, especially pelagic appendicularians such as Oikopleura dioica, mediate the conversion of microbial web organisms to organic particles with high sinking rates. When pelagic appendicularians are abundant in coastal regions of the northern Gulf of Mexico, they stimulate the rapid vertical transfer of microbial web productivity in the surface layer, which is only 5–15 m thick in the coastal hypoxic region, to the sub-pycnocline layer that becomes hypoxic each summer. In this paper we present results from two studies examining the significance of this pathway. In both 2002 and 2004, we observed high production rates of appendicularians in coastal waters. Discarded gelatinous houses and fecal pellets from the appendicularian populations often provided more than 1 g m⁻² d⁻¹ of organic carbon for the establishment and maintenance of hypoxia in the northern Gulf of Mexico. This source of organic matter flux is especially important in regions far from the river plumes and during periods of low river discharge. Autotrophic elements of this food web are primarily supported by recycled inorganic nutrients originating in the Mississippi and Atchafalaya Rivers. Sources of dissolved organic matter (DOM) supporting the heterotrophic components of this microbial food web may include in situ production, the Mississippi/Atchafalaya Rivers, and Louisiana's coastal wetlands. If significant, the latter source provides a possible link between Louisiana's high rates of coastal land loss and the large hypoxic zone observed along the coast during summer. Both of the latter DOM sources are independent of phytoplankton production stimulated by inputs of riverine inorganic nutrients.     

Short-term bacterial reactivity of nitrogen-enriched seawater of a eutrophic lagoon

We carried out, in September, a 24 h experiment to determine the potential reactivity of bacterial communities found in the sea water in Arcachon Basin (France). To create eutrophic systems, batches of seawater were enriched with 30 mgl^?1 of either ammonium chloride or amino acids. Samples were taken every 3 h. Quantitative measurements were made of direct counts (AODC), biomass and ATP content. The heterotrophic bacterial communities were defined in terms of their catabolic potentialities and ‘specific’ diversity. Bacterial heterotrophic activity was established by measuring heterotrophic uptake and the mineralization percentage of labelled glucose or amino acids. From these data, ratios of AMP/ATP and P/B were calculated where P is the uptake of labelled substrate and B is the biomass.After the nitrogen enrichment an increase of the respiration was seen at first. After 6 h, a biomass peak appeared associated with a continuous increase in the number of cells. Bacterial growth was concurrent with a qualitative modification of the community: UAI increased, and diversity dropped. A less diversified community resulted suggesting an immature ecological state (zymogenous bacterial). Low values of respiration percentage (20%) characterized high growth yields.     

Early Diagenesis of Plant Pigments in Hudson River Sediments

Plant pigment concentrations were measured using high performance liquid chromatography in Hudson River sediments. Sedimentation rates and mixing characteristics were determined from depth profiles of the naturally occurring radionuclides ⁷Be, ²¹⁰Pb. Previous estimates of the mean-lives (1/λ) of plant pigments (chlorophylls a and b, fucoxanthin) from laboratory experiments, indicate a range of c. 20-40 days. However, in the field, we observed that these pigments decreased less rapidly with depth and penetrated deeper than ⁷Be (mean-life 77 days) in Hudson sediments 95% of the time. Assuming similar mixing processes for particles carrying ⁷Be and pigments, this indicates that pigment decay rates in the field are slower than the 0·013 day^-1 decay rate of ⁷Be, hence, more than 2-fold slower than the derived laboratory rates. We believe that high inputs of vascular plant detritus in the Hudson may increase the complexation of humic substances with pigments resulting in slower decay rates.While most pigments showed an exponential decrease with sediment depth, lutein concentrations generally increased with depth. This pattern of decay resistance is in agreement with laboratory experiments which show that lutein is the most decay resistant among dominant pigments. These data along with other studies demonstrate that the carotenoids lacking the 5,6-epoxide group (i.e., lutein) are more decay resistant than pigments that contain it (i.e., fucoxanthin).