Upward movement of tritium from contaminated groundwaters: a numerical analysis

This paper describes a research-oriented modelling exercise that addresses the problem of assessing the movement of tritium from a contaminated perched aquifer to the land surface. Participants were provided with information on water table depth, soil characteristics, hourly meteorological and evapotranspiration data. They were asked to predict the upward migration of tritium through the unsaturated soil into the atmosphere. Eight different numerical models were used to calculate the movement of tritium. The modelling results agree within a factor of two, if very small time and space increments are used. The agreement is not so good when the near-surface soil becomes dry. The modelling of the alternate upward and downward transport of tritium close to the ground surface generally requires rather complex models and detailed input because tritium concentration varies sharply over short distances and is very sensitive to many interactive factors including rainfall amount, evapotranspiration rate, rooting depth and water table position.

Assimilation of 3H in photosynthesizing leaves exposed to HTO

Potato and wine grape plants were exposed for a period of 4 h to tritiated water vapor, and simultaneously to 14CO2 which served as a tracer for photosynthetic assimilation. During and after exposure, foliar samples were collected in which the exchangeable and nonexchangeable fractions of organic 3H were determined, taking care that the exchangeable fraction should not be lost to atmosphere. It was demonstrated that about 20% of the organic H in vegetation could be exchanged with 3H of tissue water, and that nonexchangeable 3H was fixed by photosynthesis. The kinetic behavior of the 2 forms was very different.