News

Paper accepted!

news-hydro, W00CBE-cat-cee |


Lisa's paper on the "Decadal delays in groundwater recovery from nitrate contamination caused by low oxygen reduction rates" (DOI:10.1029/2018WR023396) got accepted in Water Resources Research, a leading peer-reviewed journal in hydrogeology. This paper represents the first of a series of planned papers in our group focusing on the N and C cycles in aquatic habitats. In Lisa's paper we provide evidence that dissolved oxygen is slowly reduced in the porous aquifer through the lack of available electron donors. This leads to long residence times of nitrate in groundwater that is controlled by transport processes and redox reactions. Therefore we calculated denitrification lag times (time prior to commencement of denitrication) using 3H/3He linked with dissolved oxygen concentrations and suggest this method as a powerful tool to estimate the vulnerability of aquifers to nitrate pollution.

Thanks to everyone involved in this interesting and outstanding study that provide critical information on the vulnerability of aquifers posed by dissolved nitrate and the time frames required to achieve water quality improvements in nitrate-polluted aquifers.