Mixed, Low-level Radioactive and Other Wastes -- Amargosa Desert Research Site, Nevada

Mixed radioactive and organic wastes often are disposed in the shallow subsurface in arid regions. Contamination leaks from disposal facilities result in gaseous and water-borne contamination that violates accepted theories of contaminant transport. As a result, there are concerns for management of existing leaks and plans for future waste disposal. Inadequate knowledge of the behavior of these wastes has deadlocked national decisions about the disposition of low-level radioactive wastes. Delays in resolving these questions are costly (due to the interim solutions used) and can pose a health risk (due to the multitude of temporary waste-storage sites located in highly populated areas of the Nation).

In 1997 the Toxics Program initiated research at the Amargosa Desert Research Site (ADRS). The objective of the ADRS research team is to improve understanding of and methods for characterizing the mechanisms that control subsurface migration and fate of contaminants in arid environments. Research focuses on quantifying the processes that affect movement of radionuclides and volatile organic chemicals in these unique environments and methods to monitor and evaluate contaminant migration in the subsurface.

Project Headlines

• New Model Allows for More Accurate Simulation of Tritium Movement in the Unsaturated Zone
• Widespread Accumulations of Natural Perchlorate in Southwestern Soils
• Desert Plants Reveal Contaminant Transport Pathways
• New Model Improves Understanding of the Transport of Carbon Isotopes in the Unsaturated-Zone
• Using Plants To Detect Tritium Contamination
• High Nitrate in the Desert? What's Going On?
• Are Deserts Still Drying Out Since the Ice Age?
• New Book on Soil Analysis Methods Destined to Become a Classic

More Information

• Amargosa Desert Research Site Home Page -- The ADRS research team maintains its own home page that contains additional information about the ADRS.
• Project Bibliography
• Abstracts from Selected Meetings/Conferences
• Project Photo Gallery
• Toxics Geophysics Project
• Amargosa Desert: Studies of Nitrogen and Carbon
• For additional information about the ADRS please send e-mail to the ADRS webserver team. If you have questions please contact the team at

New Publications

Upcoming Publications

• Case study of a full-scale evapotranspiration cover: McGuire, P.E., Andraski, B.J., and Archibald, R., Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering (IN PRESS).

Newly Published

• Transport of elemental mercury in the unsaturated zone from a waste disposal site in an arid region: Walvoord, M.A., Andraski, B.J., Krabbenhoft, D.P., and Striegl, R.G., 2008, Applied Geochemistry, v. 23, no. 3, p. 572-583, doi:10.1016/j.apgeochem.2007.12.014.

Project Remediation Related Activities

• Alternative Landfill Cover Assessment
• Phytoremediation in the Desert?

Other Landfill Remediation Related Activates

• Landfill Leachate Mobilizes Arsenic Bound in Aquifer Sediments: Saco, Maine
• Quantifying Subsurface Biodegradation

Back to Contamination from Sources with Mixed Wastes Issue Based Research

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