Downward migration and transfer to plants of radiocaesium in Scottish soil profiles : a comparison with earlier studies

Following the accident at the nuclear power plant in Chernobyl in 1986, great volumes of 137Cs were distributed over large parts of the former Soviet Union and Europe. Over Scotland, radiocaesium was deposited as wet deposition. Due to the relatively long physical half-life of 30 years, there are st...

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Autor principal: Thored, Kristin
Formato: H1
Lenguaje:Inglés
sueco
Publicado: SLU/Dept. of Soil and Environment 2010
Materias:
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author Thored, Kristin
author_browse Thored, Kristin
author_facet Thored, Kristin
author_sort Thored, Kristin
collection Epsilon Archive for Student Projects
description Following the accident at the nuclear power plant in Chernobyl in 1986, great volumes of 137Cs were distributed over large parts of the former Soviet Union and Europe. Over Scotland, radiocaesium was deposited as wet deposition. Due to the relatively long physical half-life of 30 years, there are still measurable activity concentrations in the natural environment. This study was made on two organic soils, Knockandy Hill and Rora Moss, situated in the eastern part of the central highlands of Scotland. At these two sites, studies on migration and transfer between soil and plants were conducted. The aim of the thesis was to present the current state of radiocaesium in the Scottish soils and to compare these data with data from earlier studies, however, it was difficult to make any implications from this study due to variations in sampling techniques. Another aim was to study the transfer of 137Cs from soil to plant. Caesium resembles potassium and is readily fixed to clay minerals in the soil and weakly bound to organic matter. Plants have a difficulty in discriminating between the two elements, hence the uptake of caesium can be considerable. This study has, in accordance with other similar studies, shown that the transfer of radiocaesium to heather (Calluna vulgaris) is significantly higher than the transfer to different grass species. Concerning the movement of caesium in the soils no significant difference could be found between the two organic soils. Their migration depths were 8.2 and 8.8 cm and their migration rates were 0.36 and 0.39 cm y-1 for Knockandy Hill and Rora Moss, respectively.
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spelling RepoSLU8812012-04-20T14:11:20Z Downward migration and transfer to plants of radiocaesium in Scottish soil profiles : a comparison with earlier studies Thored, Kristin Radiocaesium migration rate migration depth transfer factors deposition Scotland Following the accident at the nuclear power plant in Chernobyl in 1986, great volumes of 137Cs were distributed over large parts of the former Soviet Union and Europe. Over Scotland, radiocaesium was deposited as wet deposition. Due to the relatively long physical half-life of 30 years, there are still measurable activity concentrations in the natural environment. This study was made on two organic soils, Knockandy Hill and Rora Moss, situated in the eastern part of the central highlands of Scotland. At these two sites, studies on migration and transfer between soil and plants were conducted. The aim of the thesis was to present the current state of radiocaesium in the Scottish soils and to compare these data with data from earlier studies, however, it was difficult to make any implications from this study due to variations in sampling techniques. Another aim was to study the transfer of 137Cs from soil to plant. Caesium resembles potassium and is readily fixed to clay minerals in the soil and weakly bound to organic matter. Plants have a difficulty in discriminating between the two elements, hence the uptake of caesium can be considerable. This study has, in accordance with other similar studies, shown that the transfer of radiocaesium to heather (Calluna vulgaris) is significantly higher than the transfer to different grass species. Concerning the movement of caesium in the soils no significant difference could be found between the two organic soils. Their migration depths were 8.2 and 8.8 cm and their migration rates were 0.36 and 0.39 cm y-1 for Knockandy Hill and Rora Moss, respectively. SLU/Dept. of Soil and Environment 2010 H1 eng swe https://stud.epsilon.slu.se/881/
spellingShingle Radiocaesium
migration rate
migration depth
transfer factors
deposition
Scotland
Thored, Kristin
Downward migration and transfer to plants of radiocaesium in Scottish soil profiles : a comparison with earlier studies
title Downward migration and transfer to plants of radiocaesium in Scottish soil profiles : a comparison with earlier studies
title_full Downward migration and transfer to plants of radiocaesium in Scottish soil profiles : a comparison with earlier studies
title_fullStr Downward migration and transfer to plants of radiocaesium in Scottish soil profiles : a comparison with earlier studies
title_full_unstemmed Downward migration and transfer to plants of radiocaesium in Scottish soil profiles : a comparison with earlier studies
title_short Downward migration and transfer to plants of radiocaesium in Scottish soil profiles : a comparison with earlier studies
title_sort downward migration and transfer to plants of radiocaesium in scottish soil profiles : a comparison with earlier studies
topic Radiocaesium
migration rate
migration depth
transfer factors
deposition
Scotland