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1999 Progress Report: Modeling Transport in Aquatic Systems
EPA Grant Number: R825433C056Subproject: this is subproject number 056 , established and managed by the Center Director under grant R825433
(EPA does not fund or establish subprojects; EPA awards and manages the overall grant for this center).
Center: EERC - Center for Ecological Health Research (Cal Davis)
Center Director: Rolston, Dennis E.
Title: Modeling Transport in Aquatic Systems
Investigators: Mount, Jeff
Institution: University of California - Davis
EPA Project Officer: Levinson, Barbara
Project Period: October 1, 1996 through September 30, 2000
Project Period Covered by this Report: October 1, 1998 through September 30, 1999
RFA: Exploratory Environmental Research Centers (1992)
Research Category: Center for Ecological Health Research , Targeted Research
Description:
Objective:To combine hydrological, geochemical and environmental magnetic methods to document provenance of particles and to track particles during transport and deposition; develop mixing models for identification of sediment sources and influences of changing land use practices on particle composition and volume; and use results to improve understanding of inputs of sediment and other water quality constituents from upper watersheds into river systems.
Progress Summary:The modeling project to couple hydrographic models, transport of toxic substances, and population biology has matured to the point that other sources of funding (the EPA/NSF Watershed program) supports the continuation of the large scale finite elements hydrological models and the coupled fisheries analysis. The Center now has geographic descriptors of water bodies covering the entire state, and models ranging from the major dams on the Sacramento River system, through the Delta and into San Francisco Bay and the coastal ocean. The models have been adapted to Clear Lake, where they are being used to model the movement of mercury from the Superfund site.
As a result, we have been able to shift the emphasis toward an empirical assessment of some of the major unknowns in the current model, including developing a better understanding of the causes and geographic distribution of runoff and non-point inputs, particularly sediment from upper watersheds into the larger rivers and estuary best treated by the current model. We have begun by expanding the sediment transport measurements and modeling started in the Clear Lake project. In particular, a detailed sediment source sampling program is currently underway within the Sacramento basin, with an emphasis on sampling within the Clear Lake/Cache Creek Watershed. The sampling involves surface grab samples and short cores within Clear Lake, and bedload and suspended load samples within the Cache Creek Watershed and its tributaries.
Using cluster analysis, we are attempting to classify source materials into specific categories that are dependent upon their geochemistry and mineralogy. Mass-balance equations, which can be solved simultaneously through weighted linear least squares, are being developed in order to establish and calibrate a mixing model for source areas of sediment.
In addition to the geochemical analyses, the magnetic properties of bulk samples are currently being analyzed in order to identify a broad range of sources of ferromagnetic minerals, including parent rock, pedogenic minerals and authigenic minerals. Time-series analysis of magnetic and geochemical properties of sediments in Clear Lake cores have allowed us to identify temporal changes in relative contributions of source areas due to anthropogenic changes.
In conjunction with our geochemical and magnetic analyses of sediments we are developing a GIS-based distributional data base for the Clear Lake Basin. This data base includes sample localities, and vegetation, land use, soils, geology, rainfall/runoff coverages, and DEMs. These coverages, coupled with digital terrane analyses, are currently being integrated with the geochemical/magnetic properties and time-series analyses in order to identify the role of changing land uses in changing sediment source areas.
Future Activities:Next year we will expand our particle tracking into an analysis of provenance within the entire Sacramento River Watershed and to assist on-going sediment source area studies currently being conducted within the Lake Tahoe basin.
This long-term goal of this research is to address three key issues:
· Sediment Provenance: high fine-grained sediment loads within the Sacramento
Watershed have led to a range of habitat and water quality impacts. Resource
managers and policy makers operating within the basin currently have no way
to identify the relative contribution of source areas and the role of land use
changes in increased sediment yields. A long-term goal of this project is to
develop a GIS-based, predictive model for fingerprinting sources and developing
source mixing models, with an emphasis on identifying material contributed from
sensitive or highly erosive areas of the watershed. The results of this work
will be incorporated into strategies for long-term monitoring of changes in
sources and yields within the watershed.
· Fingerprinting toxic metal sources: mercury, derived primarily from mercury mining in the Coast Ranges and gold and silver processing in the Sierra Nevada, is a major contaminant within the system, commonly exceeding allowable TMDLs. A preliminary body of research conducted within the Center indicates that point source inputs of mercury are contributing the bulk of the load to the system. On-going efforts to identify these hot spots will be coordinated with sediment provenance studies.
· Short- and long-term dispersal of metals by fluvial processes: the movement of most mercury within the Sacramento and Bay/Delta system is tied closely to the transport and storage of sediment. Mercury, ranging from organic complexes to Hg adsorbed onto clays, has varying residence times within sediment depocenters. Preliminary studies conducted through the Center have shown that mercury is currently stored in hydraulic mining era sediments in the Sierra Nevada, Sacramento Valley and Bay/Delta. Sediment provenance studies, including time-series analysis of Bay-Delta cores, will aid in reconstructing the causes, sources and rates of flux of mining-era sediments and mercury within the watershed.
The analysis of sediment sources is tightly coupled with a number of other CEHR projects. It will define more accurate loads and timelines of sediment and mercury inputs into the Bay-Delta projects (e.g. A.2, A.3, A.7) and time series analyses (IV.4). It will also refine the analysis of both upstream sources and downstream fate of sediment in the Clear Lake basin itself (B.4, B.6, B.8). We also plan to use spatial data from the GIS studies (IV.1) to look for geological, climatological, and land cover attributes associated with high non-point source loads. The information from these analyses will aid the outreach activities assisting EPA Region IX and the state and regional water boards in evaluating TMDL issues, assessing and managing risks associated with sedimentation and non-point inputs, at the watershed level (Outreach, IV.5).
Supplemental Keywords:Ecosystem Protection/Environmental Exposure & Risk, Water, INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION, Scientific Discipline, RFA, ECOSYSTEMS, Water & Watershed, Aquatic Ecosystem Restoration, Aquatic Ecosystems & Estuarine Research, Terrestrial Ecosystems, Aquatic Ecosystem, Biochemistry, Environmental Microbiology, Fate & Transport, Watersheds, Monitoring/Modeling, Ecology and Ecosystems, ecological impact, contaminant transport models, aquatic, fate and transport, watershed management, watershed restoration, Clear Lake, ecological research, ecology assessment models, chemical kinetics, wetland restoration, material transport, ambient particle properties, aquatic ecosystems, ecosystem assessment, environmental stress, sediment transport, groundwater contamination, watershed sustainablility, water circulation, hydrology, modeling, watershed influences, restoration strategies, ecosystem stress, ecological models, integrated watershed model, transport modeling
Progress and Final Reports:
Original Abstract
Final Report
Main Center Abstract and Reports:
R825433 EERC - Center for Ecological Health Research (Cal Davis)
Subprojects under this Center:
(EPA does not fund or establish subprojects; EPA awards and manages the overall grant for this center).
R825433C001 Potential for Long-Term Degradation of Wetland Water Quality Due to Natural Discharge of Polluted Groundwater
R825433C002 Sacramento River Watershed
R825433C003 Endocrine Disruption in Fish and Birds
R825433C004 Biomarkers of Exposure and Deleterious Effect: A Laboratory and Field Investigation
R825433C005 Fish Developmental Toxicity/Recruitment
R825433C006 Resolving Multiple Stressors by Biochemical Indicator Patterns and their Linkages to Adverse Effects on Benthic Invertebrate Patterns
R825433C007 Environmental Chemistry of Bioavailability in Sediments and Water Column
R825433C008 Reproduction of Birds and mammals in a terrestrial-aquatic interface
R825433C009 Modeling Ecosystems Under Combined Stress
R825433C010 Mercury Uptake by Fish
R825433C011 Clear Lake Watershed
R825433C012 The Role of Fishes as Transporters of Mercury
R825433C013 Wetlands Restoration
R825433C014 Wildlife Bioaccumulation and Effects
R825433C015 Microbiology of Mercury Methylation in Sediments
R825433C016 Hg and Fe Biogeochemistry
R825433C017 Water Motions and Material Transport
R825433C018 Economic Impacts of Multiple Stresses
R825433C019 The History of Anthropogenic Effects
R825433C020 Wetland Restoration
R825433C021 Sierra Nevada Watershed Project
R825433C022 Regional Transport of Air Pollutants and Exposure of Sierra Nevada Forests to Ozone
R825433C023 Biomarkers of Ozone Damage to Sierra Nevada Vegetation
R825433C024 Effects of Air Pollution on Water Quality: Emission of MTBE and Other Pollutants From Motorized Watercraft
R825433C025 Regional Movement of Toxics
R825433C026 Effect of Photochemical Reactions in Fog Drops and Aerosol Particles on the Fate of Atmospheric Chemicals in the Central Valley
R825433C027 Source Load Modeling for Sediment in Mountainous Watersheds
R825433C028 Stress of Increased Sediment Loading on Lake and Stream Function
R825433C029 Watershed Response to Natural and Anthropogenic Stress: Lake Tahoe Nutrient Budget
R825433C030 Mercury Distribution and Cycling in Sierra Nevada Waterbodies
R825433C031 Pre-contact Forest Structure
R825433C032 Identification and distribution of pest complexes in relation to late seral/old growth forest structure in the Lake Tahoe watershed
R825433C033 Subalpine Marsh Plant Communities as Early Indicators of Ecosystem Stress
R825433C034 Regional Hydrogeology and Contaminant Transport in a Sierra Nevada Ecosystem
R825433C035 Border Rivers Watershed
R825433C036 Toxicity Studies
R825433C037 Watershed Assessment
R825433C038 Microbiological Processes in Sediments
R825433C039 Analytical and Biomarkers Core
R825433C040 Organic Analysis
R825433C041 Inorganic Analysis
R825433C042 Immunoassay and Serum Markers
R825433C043 Sensitive Biomarkers to Detect Biochemical Changes Indicating Multiple Stresses Including Chemically Induced Stresses
R825433C044 Molecular, Cellular and Animal Biomarkers of Exposure and Effect
R825433C045 Microbial Community Assays
R825433C046 Cumulative and Integrative Biochemical Indicators
R825433C047 Mercury and Iron Biogeochemistry
R825433C048 Transport and Fate Core
R825433C049 Role of Hydrogeologic Processes in Alpine Ecosystem Health
R825433C050 Regional Hydrologic Modeling With Emphasis on Watershed-Scale Environmental Stresses
R825433C051 Development of Pollutant Fate and Transport Models for Use in Terrestrial Ecosystem Exposure Assessment
R825433C052 Pesticide Transport in Subsurface and Surface Water Systems
R825433C053 Currents in Clear Lake
R825433C054 Data Integration and Decision Support Core
R825433C055 Spatial Patterns and Biodiversity
R825433C056 Modeling Transport in Aquatic Systems
R825433C057 Spatial and Temporal Trends in Water Quality
R825433C058 Time Series Analysis and Modeling Ecological Risk
R825433C059 WWW/Outreach
R825433C060 Economic Effects of Multiple Stresses
R825433C061 Effects of Nutrients on Algal Growth
R825433C062 Nutrient Loading
R825433C063 Subalpine Wetlands as Early Indicators of Ecosystem Stress
R825433C064 Chlorinated Hydrocarbons
R825433C065 Sierra Ozone Studies
R825433C066 Assessment of Multiple Stresses on Soil Microbial Communities
R825433C067 Terrestrial - Agriculture
R825433C069 Molecular Epidemiology Core
R825433C070 Serum Markers of Environmental Stress
R825433C071 Development of Sensitive Biomarkers Based on Chemically Induced Changes in Expressions of Oncogenes
R825433C072 Molecular Monitoring of Microbial Populations
R825433C073 Aquatic - Rivers and Estuaries
R825433C074 Border Rivers - Toxicity Studies