Modeling the emission, transport and deposition of contaminated dust from a mine tailing site
-
Michael Stovern
,
Eric A. Betterton
Abstract
Mining operations are potential sources of airborne particulate metal and metalloid contaminants through both direct smelter emissions and wind erosion of mine tailings. The warmer, drier conditions predicted for the Southwestern US by climate models may make contaminated atmospheric dust and aerosols increasingly important, due to potential deleterious effects on human health and ecology. Dust emissions and dispersion of contaminants from the Iron King Mine tailings in Dewey-Humboldt, Arizona, a Superfund site, are currently being investigated through in situ field measurements and computational fluid dynamics modeling. These tailings are significantly contaminated with lead and arsenic with an average soil concentration of 1616 and 1420 ppm, respectively. Similar levels of these contaminants have also been measured in soil samples taken from the area surrounding the mine tailings. Using a computational fluid dynamics model, we have been able to model dust transport from the mine tailings to the surrounding region. The model includes a distributed Eulerian model to simulate fine aerosol transport and a Lagrangian approach to model fate and transport of larger particles. In order to improve the accuracy of the dust transport simulations both regional topographical features and local weather patterns have been incorporated into the model simulations.
Acknowledgments
This work was supported by grant number P42 ES04940 from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), National Institutes of Health (NIH). The views of authors do not necessarily represent those of the NIEHS, NIH.
References
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©2014 by Walter de Gruyter Berlin/Boston
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Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Editorial
- The Pacific Basin Consortium for Environment and Health
- Environmental Exposures in Indigenous Communities
- Environmental exposure in indigenous communities: an international perspective
- Novel materials for environmental remediation of oil sands contaminants
- Metals
- Long-term health consequences of prenatal arsenic exposure: links to the genome and the epigenome
- Health hazards and mitigation of chronic poisoning from arsenic in drinking water: Taiwan experiences
- Remediation of mercury-contaminated soil – a case study
- Bioaccessibility, release kinetics, and molecular speciation of arsenic and lead in geo-dusts from the Iron King Mine Federal Superfund site in Humboldt, Arizona
- Mercury poisoning dentistry: high-level indoor air mercury contamination at selected dental sites
- Hazardous Waste
- New approaches and insights into bioremediation of hazardous waste
- Modeling the emission sources for polychlorinated biphenyls in India: implications for human health risk assessment
- Microorganism-assisted phytoremediation of heavy metal and endosulfan contaminated soil
- Chemicals: friends and foes
- Spatial distribution of persistent organic pollutants in the surface water of River Brahmaputra and River Ganga in India
- Hexachlorocyclohexane: persistence, toxicity and decontamination
- E-waste: impacts, issues and management strategies
- Water
- Clean water and sanitation in developing areas lacking conventional power
- Striving for success in sanitation, hygiene, and water supply
- Solar membrane distillation: desalination for the Navajo Nation
- Climate change and managing water crisis: Pakistan’s perspective
- Effective utilization of waste water through recycling, reuse, and remediation for sustainable agriculture
- Mining
- Socially responsible mining: the relationship between mining and poverty, human health and the environment
- Modeling the emission, transport and deposition of contaminated dust from a mine tailing site
- Coal mine drainage sludge and its application for treating metallic mine effluent
- Emerging Issues in the Pacific Basin
- Nanotechnology and toxicology
- Nanotoxicology and nanotechnology: new findings from the NIEHS and Superfund Research Program scientific community
- Nanotechnology in environmental remediation: degradation of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) over visible-light-active nanostructured materials
- Combating infectious diseases in the Pacific Islands: sentinel surveillance, environmental health, and geospatial tools
- Projected health impacts of heat events in Washington State associated with climate change
- Community-based approaches to environmental health research around the globe
- Air Pollution
- Particulate air pollution and cardiovascular disease – it is time to take it seriously
- Chemical exposure and respiratory health of children in an industrial setting
- Fine particles characterization in residential homes located in different microenvironment of India
- Respiratory health risk assessment of children living close to industrial areas in Indonesia
