Abstract
Freshly excavated overburden (spoils) dumped during open-cut coal mining generate saline leachate that can lead to environmental impacts. Predictions of leachate salinity remain uncertain, largely due to incomplete knowledge of responses of spoils to varying moisture conditions. This study carried out column leaching experiments on four spoil types, originating from Queensland, Australia. Following characterisation of the fresh spoil material, four moisture regimes were tested: three wetting-drying conditions with leaching occurring biweekly, weekly, and fortnightly and one completely saturated regime with leaching occurring weekly. Thirty-four leaching cycles were conducted except for one spoil type for which only 12 cycles were completed. Results showed higher EC and leachate ion concentrations from the saturated regime, while among the wetting-drying regimes, the spoil leached on a fortnightly basis resulted in higher salt release for two geochemically similar spoil types. Overall, lower and steady pH was recorded for spoils leached under saturated conditions. Irrespective of spoil type, sodium was the dominating cation contributing to the overall leachate salinity. The paper provides new insights into parameterising leaching models and in the role of water-rock interactions which informs experimental design and conceptualisation of full-scale models.
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Data Availability
The data generated and analysed during the current study is available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
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Acknowledgment
The authors would like to thank Vinod Nath, Melinda Hilton, Thomas Baumgartl, and Ian Callow for their assistance with the project. The authors would also like to thank the anonymous reviewers who provided helpful comments on the earlier version of the paper.
Funding
The funding for this research was provided by the Australian Coal Association Research Program, project number C25039 and C28043.
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Karan Rishabhkumar Jain: conceptualisation, methodology, formal analysis, investigation, writing—original draft. Mansour Edraki: conceptualisation; methodology; writing, review and editing; supervision; funding acquisition. Neil McIntyre: conceptualisation; methodology; writing, review and editing; supervision; funding acquisition.
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Appendix
Appendix
Figs. 8, 9, 10, Table 4, Figs. 11 and 12
Degradation test conducted by Edraki et al. (2019) on studied spoil results
Magnesium (a) and potassium (b) ion leachate concentration (mg/kg) from first nine leaching cycles (spoil B9, unsaturated column leachate concentration only for first six cycles)
Alkalinity as CaCO3 leachate concentration (mg/kg) from first nine leaching cycles (spoil B9, unsaturated column leachate concentration only for first six cycles)
The relationship of calcium (Ca) to strontium (Sr) in leachate. Linear trendline with R2 value shown as a reference for fortnightly leached column
Electrical conductivity µS/cm for replicates of spoil B8 and A10. EC values shown are the average of the leachate volume collected in each cycle
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Jain, K.R., Edraki, M. & McIntyre, N. Controls of Wetting and Drying Cycles on Salt Leaching from Coal Mine Spoils. Water Air Soil Pollut 232, 472 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11270-021-05422-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11270-021-05422-7