| The impacts of mining on water quality in the western United States have become the focus of increased environmental concern and regulatory effort in recent years. An assessment of potential mining impacts on local water quality is necessary because of possible adverse effects including acid mine drainage, elevated trace metal concentrations, and high dissolved solids such as sulfate.;Although a wide variety of geochemical modeling software packages are available, none are designed specifically for the purpose of modeling pit lake geochemistry, and no regulatory framework or standard exists for such modeling efforts. This study was designed to evaluate hydrogeochemical modeling software that might be applicable to modeling post-mining, pit water geochemistry. Data from the Cortez Mine, a carbonate-hosted, open pit, precious metal mine in Nevada, are used in an inverse model to determine geochemical mass transfer that has occurred between the mine wallrock and the pit lake. These results guide the development of a forward reaction path model that may be used for future mine sites.;The study demonstrates that pit lake chemical evolution can be modeled with available software packages, using existing mine environments to guide model development. The incorporation of site-specific kinetic data will allow application of this model to the prediction of geochemical evolution in future pit lakes. (Abstract shortened by UMI.). |
