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Modeling of Groundwater Contamination by Phenol Released from Spilled Bitumen
Author(s) -
Tang Joseph S.
Publication year - 2003
Publication title -
the canadian journal of chemical engineering
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.404
H-Index - 67
eISSN - 1939-019X
pISSN - 0008-4034
DOI - 10.1002/cjce.5450810120
Subject(s) - groundwater , phenol , environmental science , contamination , aquifer , pollution , leaching (pedology) , asphalt , environmental chemistry , tracer , surface water , environmental engineering , hydrology (agriculture) , soil science , chemistry , geology , materials science , geotechnical engineering , ecology , physics , organic chemistry , soil water , nuclear physics , composite material , biology
Leaching of phenol from spilled bitumen into flowing aquifer poses an environmental threat to groundwater contamination. A two‐dimensional model with de‐coupled transfer was built to model phenol propagation in the flowing stream. The model predicted that the produced phenol concentration monitored at an observation well would rise sharply and then decline gradually as the phenol flux emerging from the bitumen surface was depleted with time. The model is useful in estimating the size of the spill, produced phenol concentration, phenol spatial distribution and the time required for the phenol concentration to decline to an environmentally acceptable level. It is well suited to other water pollution problems with chemical spills.