Some fundamental hydrologic issues pertinent to environmental activities at Los Alamos National Laboratory, New Mexico

Abstract

-Monitoring/restoring the 2000+ contaminated sites at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) and protecting ground water in future waste-disposal activities, requires an understanding of the hydrologic system(s) on the Pajarito Plateau. Despite previous work, the conceptual hydrogeologic model for LANL is incomplete. Some fairly basic questions about ground-water occurrence, movement and quality remain. For example, what is the number of perched-water zones, the depth of ground water, the extent of perched-water zones, the possibility of recharge through the tuff, the ground-water flow direction near well fields, the origin of springs in White Rock Canyon, the fate of perched ground water, the water budget for the Pajarito Plateau, the background hydrochemistry for the saturated zones and the inventory ofradionuclides in canyons receiving effluent? Answering these involves synthesis of existing information, collection of new data and rethinking of current concepts.