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Title: Subseabed disposal project annual reports: environmental studies, October 1981-September 1983

Technical Report ·
OSTI ID:5557009

The goal of the Environmental Studies Program is to be able to make reliable predictions of the radionuclide concentrations in marine biota that are potentially important for critical pathways to humans, collective population doses, and doses to selected marine organisms. Achieving this goal requires reliable modeling of the physical dispersion process, including geochemical and biological mediation, and overlaying the biological pathways to biota and humans on the resulting radionuclide concentration fields. The models that are being used simulate the actual oceanic field using site-specific data locally. With them, dispersion from an ocean-bottom source can be described from boundary-layer scales to world ocean scales. The overall veracity of the results has yet to be demonstrated since the models are still in the developmental stage. For example, the effects of very steep, large-relief topography such as seamounts cannot currently be modeled. In addition, the range of physical parameters that can be used in the REM barely includes the most energetic regions of the western boundary currents. Also, no coastal shelf models are available to describe coastal/interior exchange, and no operational model of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current exists to describe the mass exchange between oceans, antarctic upwelling, and/or deep water formation. However, incorporation of these features is planned.

Research Organization:
Sandia National Labs., Albuquerque, NM (USA)
DOE Contract Number:
AC04-76DP00789
OSTI ID:
5557009
Report Number(s):
SAND-85-1037; ON: DE86013075
Resource Relation:
Other Information: Portions of this document are illegible in microfiche products. Original copy available until stock is exhausted
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English