Floating nuclear power plants: Potential implications for radioactive pollution of the northern marine environment

Recent media reports as to the development, construction and possible deployment of floating nuclear power plants in the northern regions has generated significant interest in the matter. This paper presents background to the concept of floating nuclear power plants, information as to possible designs and iterations and some aspects of potential concern with respect to safety and the potential for environmental or other impacts as a result of the development and use of such systems in the northern regions.     

Reactive transport in stratified flow fields with idealized heterogeneity

A two-dimensional equation governing the steady state spatial concentration distribution of a reactive constituent within a heterogeneous advective–dispersive flow field is solved analytically. The solution which is developed for the case of a single point source can be generalized to represent analogous situations with any number of separate point sources. A limiting case of special interest has a line source of constant concentration spanning the domain’s upstream boundary. The work has relevance for improving understanding of reactive transport within various kinds of advection-dominated natural or engineered environments including rivers and streams, and bioreactors such as treatment wetlands. Simulations are used to examine quantitatively the impact that transverse dispersion (deviations from purely stochastic-convective flow) can have on mean concentration decline in the direction of flow. Results support the contention that transverse mixing serves to enhance the overall rate of reaction in such systems.     

Interpretation of Magnetic Anomalies and Estimation of Depth of Magnetic Crust in Slovakia

The magnetic map of Slovakia used in the paper was compiled as part of a project titled Atlas of Geophysical maps and profiles in 2001. The residual magnetic data were analyzed to produce Curie point estimates. To remove distortion of magnetic anomalies caused by the Earth’s magnetic field, reduction to pole transformation was applied to the magnetic anomalies using the magnetization angle of the induced magnetization. Anomalies reduced to the pole tend to be better correlated with tectonic structures. We applied a 3-km upward continuation to the residually compiled magnetic anomalies in order to remove effects of topography. The depth of magnetic dipoles was calculated by an azimuthally averaged power spectrum method for the entire area. Such estimates can be indicative of temperatures in the crust, since magnetic minerals lose their spontaneous magnetization according to Curie temperature of the dominant magnetic minerals in the rocks. The computed Curie point depths in the Slovakia region vary between 15.2 km and 20.9 km. Heat flow higher than 100 mWm⁻² occurs at the central volcanics and eastern part of Slovakia, where the Curie point depths values are shallow. The correlation between Curie point depths, heat flow and crust depth was investigated for two E-W cross sections. Heat flow and Curie point depth values are correlated with each other however, these values could not be correlated with crust depth. The Curie point isotherm, which separates magnetic and non-magnetic parts of the crust, is represented in two cross sections.     

Coupled Process Models as a Tool for Analysing Hydrothermal Systems

Hydrothermal systems are characterised by complex interactions between heat transfer, fluid flow, deformation, species transport and chemical reactions. Numerical models can provide quantitatively constrained information in regions where acquisition of new data is difficult or expensive thus providing a means for reducing risks, costs, and effort during targeting, production, and management of resources linked to hydrothermal systems. Here we show how numerical simulations of hydrothermal processes can be used to better understand coupled reactive transport in modern geothermal systems and in ancient hydrothermal ore deposits. We give examples based on the Enhanced Geothermal System at Soultz-sous-Forêts in France, hydrothermal mineralisation at Mount Isa in Australia, and the geothermal resource at Hamburg-Allermöhe in Germany.     

Wavelet-based response spectrum compatible synthesis of accelerograms—Eurocode application (EC8)

An integrated approach for addressing the problem of synthesizing artificial seismic accelerograms compatible with a given displacement design/target spectrum is presented in conjunction with aseismic design applications. Initially, a stochastic dynamics solution is used to obtain a family of simulated non-stationary earthquake records whose response spectrum is on the average in good agreement with the target spectrum. The degree of the agreement depends significantly on the adoption of an appropriate parametric evolutionary power spectral form, which is related to the target spectrum in an approximate manner. The performance of two commonly used spectral forms along with a newly proposed one is assessed with respect to the elastic displacement design spectrum defined by the European code regulations (EC8). Subsequently, the computational versatility of the family of harmonic wavelets is employed to modify iteratively the simulated records to satisfy the compatibility criteria for artificial accelerograms prescribed by EC8. In the process, baseline correction steps, ordinarily taken to ensure that the obtained accelerograms are characterized by physically meaningful velocity and displacement traces, are elucidated. Obviously, the presented approach can be used not only in the case of the EC8, for which extensive numerical results/examples are included, but also for any code provisions mandated by regulatory agencies. In any case, the presented numerical results can be quite useful in any aseismic design process dominated by the EC8 specifications.     

南京地磁台地铁干扰特征分析与抑制处理

地铁运行时产生的漏电流而形成的附加磁场会对附近的地磁观测造成严重干扰。通过对地铁供电系统的模拟分析得出了地铁干扰的一些基本特征。选取了2008年5月1日到30日南京地磁台受地铁干扰的日变数据和泉州参考地磁台日变数据,利用Welch功率谱估计法进行功率谱对比分析,发现地铁干扰主要对地磁场的Z分量、D分量的功率谱的高频部分造成影响,并且影响的频带范围几乎一致,主要集中在0．004-0．03Hz范围,而对H分量的影响比较微弱。在此基础上,通过小波变换对受干扰数据的Z分量和D分量进行干扰抑制处理,处理结果表明该方法能够有效抑制地铁造成的地磁场干扰。因此本文研究也提供了地磁台站干扰抑制的一种方法。     

天津测震台网子台地脉动分析与应用

利用地脉动信号波形数据,计算了天津台网31个地震台站背景噪声水平、地动噪声功率谱,进一步研究了台站观测环境随时间和季节的变化情况,并对整个台网的监测能力进行了重新估算,同时也对天津周边的一些大震前的地脉动进行了分析,希望能捕捉到明显的震前异常变化。     

深埋地下结构工程环境水水质异常成因分析

分析了某抽水蓄能电站地下厂房硐室群开挖引起环境水水质异常的成因。对工程区进行大范围的环境水pH值检测和代表性渗水部位水样的成分分析后发现,环境水的pH值、SO4^2-含量和总铁含量特征在一些部位发生了明显改变：水质呈强酸性、SO4^2-含量和总铁含量高且分布不均匀。结合岩石成分分析和现场黄铁矿矿化点的调查,认为该抽水蓄能电站地下厂房硐室群环境水水质的异常是由地层中不均匀分布的黄铁矿矿化点在开放条件下的氧化造成的,与厂房区锚孔中使用的化学充填材料无关。鉴于当前还没有有效防止强酸性腐蚀的材料,建议加强勘察期间水文地质条件特别是深部水文地质条件的研究,及早掌握和预测深部结构工程开挖、运行过程中由于环境条件改变可能导致的水质改变,以便采取预防措施。     

阵列感应测井分辨率匹配方法及应用

测井曲线高分辨率处理对薄层测井评价意义重大。俄罗斯感应测井（HIL）仪器已经在中国应用,存在的主要问题之一是4种探测深度曲线分辨率不匹配。本文基于感应测井的信息补偿原理,在分析HIL仪器探测特性的基础上,研究了针对该仪器的分辨率匹配方法和处理技术,处理了假设模型资料和实际资料,初步验证了方法的正确性和处理实际资料的可行性。