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Residence time distribution in the Kirkgoz karst springs (Antalya-Turkey) as a tool for contamination vulnerability assessment

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Environmental Geology

Abstract

Lumped parameter modeling of environmental tracer (tritium, CFCs and tritiogenic helium-3) transport in the Kirkgoz karst springs (Antalya-Turkey) appears to be a useful tool for assessing the vulnerability to contamination. Based on tritium observations between 1963 and 2000, the springs revealed a mean residence time (MRT) of 120 years. This suggests an active transport volume of 71 billion cubic meters for the aquifer, a value that is coherent with the estimated void volume of karst aquifer based on the mass of associated travertine deposits. The CFC-11 and CFC-12 MRTs are in agreement with tritium-based MRT, after correcting for excess air effect. Excess crustal and mantle helium flux hindered the use of tritiogenic helium-3 as a potential tracer. The residence time distribution (RTD) indicates a groundwater transport system that is fed by recharges extending back to past several hundred years. This wide RTD suggests that any recent contamination that may have entered the system could progress slowly within the entire aquifer but would be unnoticed in the early period because of the dilution effect of uncontaminated past recharge waters. Once the contamination is recognized, it may last for many centuries ahead even if the contamination practice is stopped. Thus, control of contaminant release to aquifer and monitoring of contaminant level in Kirkgoz springs is an immediate task for the associated public health authorities.

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Acknowledgment

D. Kip Solomon (University of Utah) and C. Serdar Bayari (Hacettepe University) are gratefully acknowledged for stimulating the author to study CFCs and noble gas isotopes in karst systems. This study is dedicated to the memories of Yucel Yurtsever and Ronit Nativ whose studies contributed a lot to the understanding of the hydrogeology of Kirkgoz springs.

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  1. Department of Geological Engineering, Hacettepe University, Beytepe, Ankara, 06800, Turkey

    N. Nur Ozyurt

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  1. N. Nur Ozyurt
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Ozyurt, N.N. Residence time distribution in the Kirkgoz karst springs (Antalya-Turkey) as a tool for contamination vulnerability assessment. Environ Geol 53, 1571–1583 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00254-007-0811-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00254-007-0811-x

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