Legacy mercury: A watershed scale cleanup challenge - 15559
- Oak Ridge National Laboratory (United States)
Over the next three decades, the US Department of Energy (DOE) Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (OREM) will focus on reducing the flux of mercury contamination that exits at the Y-12 National Security Complex (Y-12 NSC) [1, 2]. OREM, Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation (TDEC), and US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) have identified mercury contamination within and released from the Y-12 NSC as the highest priority cleanup risk on the Oak Ridge Reservation (ORR). Furthermore, mercury contamination is a worldwide issue with more than 3,000 mercury-contaminated sites currently identified [3], and the United Nations Environment Programme has recently highlighted the risk of this contamination to human health [4]. Unlike other contaminants-metals, radionuclides, and organic solvents-that impact the DOE Environmental Management (DOE-EM) cleanup program at the ORR and other DOE sites, mercury has several unique characteristics that make environmental remediation of the Y-12 NSC one of the most complex efforts ever encountered. These distinctive physicochemical properties for mercury include the following: it is a dense non-aqueous liquid at ambient-temperature-pressure; it is the only metal that bio-magnifies; and it is the only contaminant transported as both a cation and/or a dissolved or gaseous elemental metal (similar to an organic solvent) under environmental conditions. Most importantly, mercury also undergoes biogeochemical transformation processes, which include aqueous and surface complexation, redox reactions, and atypical methylation reactions, producing the potent neurotoxin methylmercury [5, 6]. Each of the aforementioned distinctive characteristics for mercury is observed within this heterogeneous and dynamic watershed-scale system-which includes the Y-12 NSC boundary and 23 km of contaminated creek and flood plain downstream. Because of these complexities, implementing cost effective and sustainable solutions that reduce mercury flux from various primary and secondary contamination sources will require the linking of basic science understanding and applied research advancements into OREM's cleanup process. In 2009, the DOE-EM Office of Site Restoration's Soil and Groundwater Remediation Program and Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) initiated an applied field research initiative with the goal of developing a systems-based approach to control mercury flux in soil and water to protect surface water, groundwater, and ecological receptors. The Remediation of Mercury and Industrial Contaminants Applied Field Research Initiative (ROMIC-AFRI) represents the vehicle that enables the linking of science to remedial applications. Here we discuss the progress made to date in addressing key applied research and technology development needs to address this watershed scale conundrum. (authors)
- Research Organization:
- WM Symposia, Inc., PO Box 27646, 85285-7646 Tempe, AZ (United States)
- OSTI ID:
- 22824431
- Report Number(s):
- INIS-US-19-WM-15559; TRN: US19V1004069477
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: WM2015: Annual Waste Management Symposium, Phoenix, AZ (United States), 15-19 Mar 2015; Other Information: Country of input: France; 17 refs.; available online at: http://archive.wmsym.org/2015/index.html
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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Related Subjects
AMBIENT TEMPERATURE
CONTAMINATION
COST EFFECTIVENESS ANALYSIS
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION
FLOODS
GROUND WATER
HEALTH HAZARDS
MERCURY
METHYLATION
METHYLMERCURY
OAK RIDGE RESERVATION
ORGANIC SOLVENTS
RADIOISOTOPES
REDOX REACTIONS
REMEDIAL ACTION
SOILS
UNITED NATIONS
US EPA
WATERSHEDS