Degradation of tritium in the unsaturated zone

If the unsaturated zone is composed of relatively fine sediment (silt and fine sands) a quasi-uniform seepage flow can be assumed for the unsaturated zone in humid climate zones over long time spans. Therefore, the transport of infiltration water can be simulated in PHREEQC as a monotonous movement in accordance with the piston flow model. A constant flow of infiltration water of 0.5 m per year is assumed for the following simulation. Furthermore, it is considered simplistically that the infiltrating precipitation has a tritium activity of 2000 TU (tritium units) over a period of 10 years. Then, it is assumed that the tritium activity decreases to zero again. 

The following example shows how this can be modeled in PHREEQC. First of all, a master- ami a solution species tritium T or T1 have to be defined. Since the input of data for log k und -gamma within the key word SOLUTION SPECIES is required, but unknown, any value can be entered here as a free parameter ( dummy , e g. 0.0). This value is not used for kinetic calculations and thus, does not cause any problems. However, all results based on equilibrium calculations (e.g. the calculation of the saturation index) are nonsense for this species . The tritium values have to be entered in tritium units. However, in order not to have to define or convert them in an extra step, they are entered fictitiously with the unit umol/kgw instead of TU in PHREEQC. As no interactions of tritium with any other species are defined, the unit is eventually irrelevant. After modeling, remember that the result is displayed in mol/kgw as always in PHREEQC and has to be recalculated to the fictitious tritium unit umol/kgw. Entering mol/kgw in the input file, the solution algorithm quits due to problems with too high total ionic strengths. 

The degradation of tritium is described as a 1st order kinetic reaction as follows (see also Table 14)  

PHREEOC Job Tritium in the unsaturated zone - impulse like input function TITLE tritium in the unsaturatcd zone 

SOLUTION SPECIES define solution species tritium 

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Remodel the degradation of tritium in the unsaturated zone with this new input function. Compare your results with the results obtained from the assumption of an impulse-like tritium input in Fig. 42. 

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