Experimental study and numerical simulation of soil water and salt transport under dry drainage conditions

Coal mining has serious impacts on local environment, including damage to the land and soil by subsidence, damage to ground-water systems through the fracturing and subsiding of overlying rocks, contamination of surface waters with acid mine drainage, and pollution of the atmosphere by release of toxic gases. The damage to ground water and its consequent impacts on the regional environment is the core of research of the coal mining from the perspective of environment protection. The present paper focuses on the changes of surface vegetation coverage, the pollutants released from pit coal power plants, and the damages to the ground aquifers induced by mining activities in arid Eastern Junggar coalfield of China. At first, the authors investigated the changes of surface vegetation coverage, since mining began in the 2000s using Landsat data. Results show that the low surface vegetation coverage (grade 1 plus grade 2) in the southern part of the region decreased from 11.62?×?10⁸ m² in 2003 to 9.57?×?10⁸ m² in 2017 (?17.6%), while it increased from 11.58?×?10⁸ m² in 2003 to 12.70?×?10⁸ m² in 2017 (+?9.7%) in the eastern part. The high surface vegetation coverage (grade 3 plus grade 4) in the southern part increased from 1.94?×?10⁸ m² in 2003 to 4.00?×?10⁸ m² in 2017 (+?106.2%), while it decreased from 4.39?×?10⁸ m² in 2003 to 3.26?×?10⁸ m² in 2017 (?25.74%) in the eastern part. The data of annual precipitation during the same period in this area show that the changes of surface vegetation coverage have less relationship with the annual precipitation, which indicates that the mining activities is probably the major factor for that. Second, a statistic of air pollutants generated from pit coal power plants was made based on data of references. Results show that the estimated gaseous pollutant emissions increased as 865.23 tons of smoke particles, 5940.73 tons of SO₂, and 7584.48 tons of NO₂ in 2013, which increased rapidly with 9.73 times the smoke particle, 21.69 times the SO₂, and 9.24 times the NO₂ than that of 2007. And then, the physical and numerical simulation of the damage of mining activities to aquifers was made to show the permeability of the reference points of overlying aquifers varies associated with mining activities. Results show that the porous rock matrix permeability has a negative relationship with fluctuation during mining, while the fracture permeability shows a positive one. Finally, a case investigation in southern area surrounding this coalfield was illustrated. Result shows that the local ground-water level decreased by 16 m difference from the altitude level of?+?774 m in 2003 to?+?758 m in 2013. Data and results from this study presented the already and the potential pollutions and damages to local environment induced by the mining activities in this region.

     

Soil organic carbon pools in particle-size fractions as affected by slope gradient and land use change in hilly regions, western Iran

This study was conducted to explore the effects of topography and land use changes on particulate organic carbon(POC),particulate total nitrogen(PTN),organic carbon(OC) and total nitrogen(TN) associated with different size primary particle fractions in hilly regions of western Iran.Three popular land uses in the selected site including natural forest(NF),disturbed forest(DF) and cultivated land(CL) and three slope gradients(0-10 %,S1,10-30 %,S2,and 30-50%,S3) were employed as the basis of soil sampling.A total of 99 soil samples were taken from the 0-10 cm surface layer in the whole studied hilly region studied.The results showed that the POC in the forest land use in all slope gradients was considerably more than the deforested and cultivated lands and the highest value was observed at NF-S1 treatment with 9.13%.The values of PTN were significantly higher in the forest land use and in the down slopes(0.5%) than in the deforested and cultivated counterparts and steep slopes(0.09%) except for the CL land use.The C:N ratios in POC fraction were around 17-18 in the forest land and around 23 in the cultivated land.In forest land,the silt-associated OC was highest among the primary particles.The enrichment factor of SOC,EC,was the highest for POC.For the primary particles,EC of both primary fractions of silt and clay showed following trend for selected land uses and slope gradients:CL> DF> NF and S3 > S2> S1.Slope gradient of landscape significantly affected the OC and TN contents associated with the silt and clay particles,whereas higher OC and TN contents were observed in lower positions and the lowest value was measured in the steep slopes.Overall,the results showed that native forest land improves soil organic carbon storage and can reduce the carbon emission and soil erosion especially in the mountainous regions with high rainfall in west of Iran.