The 2019 Brumadinho tailings dam collapse: Possible cause and impacts of the worst human and environmental disaster in Brazil     

《International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation》2020

On 25th January 2019, the tailings dam of the Brumadinho iron mine operated by Vale S/A failed catastrophically. The death toll stood at 259 and 11 people remained missing as of January 2020. This tragedy occurred three years after Mariana’s tailings dam rupture – the most significant tailing dam disaster in Brazilian history. Thus far, a systematic investigation on the cause and effect of the failure has yet to be conducted. Here, we use satellite-driven soil moisture index, multispectral high-resolution imagery and Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) products to assess pre-disaster scenarios and the direct causes of the tailings dam collapse. A decreasing trend in the moisture content at the surface and the full evanescence of pond water through time (2011–2019) suggest that the water was gradually penetrating the fill downwards and caused the seepage erosion, saturating the tailings dam. Large-scale slumping of the dam (extensional failure) upon the rupture indicates that the materials of the fill were already saturated. InSAR measurements reveal a dramatic, up to 30 cm subsidence in the dam (at the rear part) within the past 12 months before the dam collapse, signifying that the sediments had been removed from the fill. Although the information on the resistance level of the tailings dam to infiltrations is not available, these pieces of evidence collectively indicate that the seepage erosion (piping) is the primary cause for the chronic weakening of the structure and, hence, the internal “liquefaction” condition. Upon the collapse, the fully saturated mud tailings flowed down the gentle slope area (3.13 × 10⁶ m²), where 73 % were originally covered by tree, grass or agricultural tracts. The toxic mud eventually reached the Paraopeba River after travelling 10 km, abruptly increasing the suspended particulate matter (SPM) concentration and the toxic chemical elements in the river, immediately affecting the local livelihoods that depend on its water. The Paraopeba River is a major tributary of the San Francisco River, the second-longest river in Brazil reaching the Atlantic Ocean. We anticipate that the environmental repercussions of this toxic seepage will be felt throughout the entire basin, especially riverine communities located downstream.  相似文献   

Integration of hyperspectral and LiDAR data for mapping small water bodies     

《International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation》2020

Inland water bodies are globally threatened by environmental degradation and climate change. On the other hand, new water bodies can be designed during landscape restoration (e.g. after coal mining). Effective management of new water resources requires continuous monitoring; in situ surveys are, however, extremely time-demanding. Remote sensing has been widely used for identifying water bodies. However, the use of optical imagery is constrained by accuracy problems related to the difficulty in distinguishing water features from other surfaces with low albedo, such as tree shadows. This is especially true when mapping water bodies of different sizes. To address these problems, we evaluated the potential of integrating hyperspectral data with LiDAR (hereinafter “integrative approach”). The study area consisted of several spoil heaps containing heterogeneous water bodies with a high variability of shape and size. We utilized object-based classification (Support Vector Machine) based on: (i) hyperspectral data; (ii) LiDAR variables; (iii) integration of both datasets. Besides, we classified hyperspectral data using pixel-based approaches (K-mean, spectral angle mapper). Individual approaches (hyperspectral data, LiDAR data and integrative approach) resulted in 2–22.4 % underestimation of the water surface area (i.e, omission error) and 0.4–1.5 % overestimation (i.e., commission error).The integrative approach yielded an improved discrimination of open water surface compared to other approaches (omission error of 2 % and commission error of 0.4 %). We also evaluated the success of detecting individual ponds; the integrative approach was the only one capable of detecting the water bodies with both omission and commission errors below 10 %. Finally, the assessment of misclassification reasons showed a successful elimination of shadows in the integrative approach. Our findings demonstrate that the integration of hyperspectral and LiDAR data can greatly improve the identification of small water bodies and can be applied in practice to support mapping of restoration process.  相似文献   

Groundwater contaminant source identification based on iterative local update ensemble smoother          下载免费PDF全文

YANG Ai-lin  JIANG Si-min  LIU Jin-bing  JIANG Qian-yun  ZHOU Ting  ZHANG Wen 《地下水科学与工程》2020,8(1):1-9

Identification of the location and intensity of groundwater pollution source contributes to the effect of pollution remediation, and is called groundwater contaminant source identifcation. This is a kind of typical groundwater inverse problem, and the solution is usually ill-posed. Especially considering the spatial variability of hydraulic conductivity field, the identification process is more challenging. In this paper, the solution framework of groundwater contaminant source identification is composed with groundwater pollutant transport model (MT3DMS) and a data assimilation method (Iterative local update ensemble smoother, ILUES). In addition, Karhunen-Loève expansion technique is adopted as a PCA method to realize dimension reduction. In practical problems, the geostatistical method is usually used to characterize the hydraulic conductivity feld, and only the contaminant source information is inversely calculated in the identifcation process. In this study, the identification of contaminant source information under Kriging K-field is compared with simultaneous identification of source information and K-field. The results indicate that it is necessary to carry out simultaneous identification under heterogeneous site, and ILUES has good performance in solving high-dimensional parameter inversion problems.  相似文献   

岩溶水硝酸盐污染原位修复试验     

叶进霞  夏春英  卜鸿志 《中国岩溶》2020,39(2):173-179

岩溶含水层的极不均一性特征使岩溶水溶质运移受构造、裂隙空间及其发育方向控制；因环境条件复杂，开展岩溶水污染原位修复技术难度较大，截止目前，国内尚未系统地开展岩溶含水层水污染原位修复研究工作。文章选择鲁中南山区典型岩溶发育及硝酸盐污染地段，施工组合钻孔建设修复试验工程，采用“乙醇+葡萄糖”液态碳源和“聚乙烯醇+淀粉颗粒”固态反应器分别进行岩溶水硝酸盐污染原位修复试验。结果表明:浓度500 mg?L－1、1 000 mg?L－1的“乙醇+葡萄糖”反硝化溶液对硝酸盐浓度的降解率分别为6.45 %和21.52 %；单位长度组成材料“聚乙烯醇3 kg+淀粉颗粒3 kg”、“聚乙烯醇2 kg+淀粉颗粒4 kg”的两种反硝化固态反应器对硝酸盐浓度的降解率分为33.91%和34.96%。试验证明在裂隙型岩溶地区采用孔组方案进行地下水污染原位修复技术可行、且能取得较显著效果。修复工程布设方式和试验成果对类似地区开展岩溶地下水污染原位修复具一定借鉴意义。   相似文献   

改进的多道预测算子压制浅水多次波方法          下载免费PDF全文

周小鹏  刘伊克  李鹏 《地球物理学报》2019,62(2):667-679

在浅水情况下，由于观测数据中缺少近偏移距信息，水层多次波的压制面临挑战.利用多道预测算子压制水层多次波是浅水环境下压制多次波的重要方法之一，这种方法先从输入数据中估计出多道预测算子，再将预测算子和输入数据做褶积预测出水层相关多次波.然而，估计的多道预测算子很容易受噪声污染，从而影响多次波模型的精度.所以，我们提出了改进的多道预测算子压制浅水多次波方法.该方法先从数据中估计出多道预测算子，并利用估计的算子构建出精确的水层模型；然后，通过计算算子的走时信息、估计振幅信息、合成新算子三个步骤来修正原始的多道预测算子.修正的算子不仅不受噪声影响，还含有精确的走时信息、可靠的振幅信息；最后，该方法用修正的算子来预测多次波，并结合自适应相减，将预测的多次波从输入数据中去除.通过合成数据和实际资料的验证表明，相比于原始的多道预测算子压制多次波方法，改进的方法能够取得更好的压制效果.  相似文献   

Spatial and Temporal Distribution of Dust‐Bound Trace Metal Elements around Kuhdasht Watershed Area in Iran     

Hamid Alipour  Ahmad Jalalian  Naser Honarjoo  Norair Tommanian  Fereidoon Sarmadian 《洁净——土壤、空气、水》2019,47(10)

Dust, as a source of trace metal elements, affects the health of society. The spatial and temporal concentrations of dust‐bound trace metals (Cd, Pb, Ni, Zn, Cu, and Mn) in Kuhdasht watershed (456 km²), Lorestan Province, Iran, is investigated. Dust is collected using glass traps placed in ten research stations in the region. The spatial and temporal distribution of dust trace metals are plotted using ARC‐GIS. The highest and the lowest concentrations of Zn (9751150 mg kg^?1), Pb (46.352.9 mg kg^?1), and Cd (2.443.30 mg kg^?1) are obtained in winter, of Ni (98110 mg kg^?1) and Cu in autumn (16.053.5 mg kg^?1), and of Mn in summer (385505 mg kg^?1). The spatial concentrations of dust‐bound trace metals indicate all, except Cu, show a decreasing trend from the mountains toward the plains, similar to that of soil and of dust, except for Zn, which shows higher concentrations in dust than in soil. The potential sources of dust‐bound trace metals and their rate of contamination are also investigated using the enrichment and contamination factors. The major sources of Cd and Zn in the dust of watershed are due to anthropogenic activities or from activities outside the borders.  相似文献   

Modelling the Shimokita deep coalbed biosphere over deep geological time: Starvation,stimulation, material balance and population models     

Stephen A. Bowden  Abdalla Y. Mohamed  Ayad N. F. Edilbi  Yu-Shih Lin  Yuki Morono  Kai-Uwe Hinrichs  Fumio Inagaki 《Basin Research》2020,32(5):804-829

Basin models can simulate geological, geochemical and geophysical processes and potentially also the deep biosphere, starting from a burial curve, assuming a thermal history and utilizing other experimentally obtained data. Here, we apply basin modelling techniques to model cell abundances within the deep coalbed biosphere off Shimokita Peninsula, Japan, drilled during Integrated Ocean Drilling Program Expedition 337. Two approaches were used to simulate the deep coalbed biosphere: (a) In the first approach, the deep biosphere was modelled using a material balance approach that treats the deep biosphere as a carbon reservoir, in which fluxes are governed by temperature-controlled metabolic processes that retain carbon via cell-growth and cell-repair and pass it back via cell-damaging reactions. (b) In the second approach, the deep biosphere was modelled as a microbial community with a temperature-controlled growth ratio and carrying capacity (a limit on the size of the deep biosphere) modulated by diagenetic-processes. In all cases, the biosphere in the coalbeds and adjacent habitat are best modelled as a carbon-limited community undergoing starvation because labile sedimentary organic matter is no longer present and petroleum generation is yet to occur. This state of starvation was represented by the conversion of organic carbon to authigenic carbonate and the formation of kerogen. The potential for the biosphere to be stimulated by the generation of carbon-dioxide from the coal during its transition from brown to sub-bituminous coal was evaluated and a net thickness of 20 m of lignite was found sufficient to support an order of magnitude greater number of cells within a low-total organic carbon (TOC) horizon. By comparison, the stimulation of microbial populations in a coalbed or high-TOC horizon would be harder to detect because the increase in population size would be proportionally very small.  相似文献   

Investigation of gas content of organic-rich shale:A case study from Lower Permian shale in southern North China Basin,central China     

Wei Dang  Jin-Chuan Zhang  Xuan Tang  Xiao-Liang Wei  Zhong-Ming Li  Cheng-Hu Wang  Qian Chen  Chong Liu 《地学前缘(英文版)》2018,9(2):559-575

Measuring gas content is an essential step in estimating the commerciality of gas reserves. In this study,eight shale core samples from the Mouye-1 well were measured using a homemade patented gas desorption apparatus to determine their gas contents. Due to the air contamination that is introduced into the desorption canister, a mathematical method was devised to correct the gas quantity and quality.Compared to the chemical compositions of desorbed gas, the chemical compositions of residual gas are somewhat different. In residual gas, carbon dioxide and nitrogen record a slight increase, and propane is first observed. This phenomenon may be related to the exposure time during the transportation of shale samples from the drilling site to the laboratory, as well as the differences in the mass, size and adsorptivity of different gas molecules. In addition to a series of conventional methods, including the USBM direct method and the Amoco Curve Fit(ACF) method, which were used here for lost gas content estimation, a Modified Curve Fit(MCF) method, based on the 'bidisperse' diffusion model, was established to estimate lost gas content. By fitting the ACF and MCF models to gas desorption data, we determined that the MCF method could reasonably describe the gas desorption data over the entire time period, whereas the ACF method failed. The failure of the ACF method to describe the gas desorption process may be related to its restrictive assumption of a single pore size within shale samples. In comparison to the indirect method, this study demonstrates that none of the three methods studied in this investigation(USBM, ACF and MCF) could individually estimate the lost gas contents of all shale samples and that the proportion of free gas relative to total gas has a significant effect on the estimation accuracy of the selected method. When the ratio of free gas to total gas is lower than 45%, the USBM method is the best for estimating the lost gas content, whereas when the ratio ranges from 45% to 75% or is more than 75%, the ACF and MCF methods, are the best options respectively.  相似文献   

花岗岩定量分类方法及与成矿空间相关关系分析 ——甘肃省西秦岭地区为例          下载免费PDF全文

王晓伟  罗建民  王玉玺  张琪  宋秉田  杨忠明  赵彦庆 《甘肃地质》2018,(1):26-31

以Q型系统聚类分析(以组内连接为聚类方法,相关性为计算模型)和判别分析交替使用的方法,对甘肃省西秦岭地区花岗岩样本中的11个氧化物测试数据进行定量处理,构建起"甘肃省西秦岭地区花岗岩(氧化物)定量分类系列模型",将西秦岭地区花岗岩分为3大类共8小类。分类结果偏重于找矿分类,依据其与西秦岭地区铜矿、铅锌矿、金矿等依据空间关系(距离岩体3 km以内),寻找"成矿相关岩体",确定找矿靶区。  相似文献   

Geodynamic setting,structure, and composition of continuous trachybasalt-trachyandesite-rhyolite series in the north of Altai-Sayan area: the role of crust-mantle interaction in continental magma formation     

A.A. Vorontsov  O.Yu. Perfilova  N.N. Kruk 《Russian Geology and Geophysics》2018,59(12):1640-1659

The geologic positions and geochemical and isotope parameters of the Ordovician-early Silurian and Early-Middle Devonian continuous volcanic series of the Minusa basin and its mountainous framing are compared. Both series are composed mostly of moderately alkaline rocks with variations in SiO₂ contents from 45 to 77 wt.%. The Ordovician-early Silurian series differs from the Early-Middle Devonian one in lower contents of TiO₂ (< 1.7 wt.%) and Fe₂O_3tot and higher contents of Al₂O₃ in all rock varieties and in the more fractionated REE patterns of trachybasalts. The compositions of both series reflect two simultaneous mechanisms of magma evolution. The main process was fractional crystallization leading to the formation of rocks from trachybasalts to trachyrhyodacites. The accessory mechanism was the contamination of fractionated melts by crustal material, anatectic melting of crust, and mixing of deep-seated magmas with crustal melts. These processes had specifics at each stage and were controlled by the composition of the sources of parental melts. Their geochemical and isotopic parameters (high alkalinity, high contents of lithophile elements, negative anomalies of Nb, Ta, and Ti, and enrichment in radiogenic Sr) point to the interaction of mantle plumes with the lithospheric mantle that was metasomatically transformed during the preceding Vendian-early Cambrian subduction processes.  相似文献