HR: 16:00h
AN: H54D-01    [Abstracts]
TI: Modeling Land Application of Food-Processing Wastewater in the Central Valley, California
AU: * Rubin, Y
EM: rubin@newton.berkeley.edu
AF: University of California, Berkeley, 627 Davis Hall, Berkeley, CA 94706, United States
AU: Benito, P
EM: phbenito@gmail.com
AF: University of California, Berkeley, 627 Davis Hall, Berkeley, CA 94706, United States
AU: Miller, G
EM: gmiller@berkeley.edu
AF: University of California, Berkeley, 627 Davis Hall, Berkeley, CA 94706, United States
AU: McLaughlin, J
EM: jpmclaughlin@gmail.com
AF: University of California, Berkeley, 627 Davis Hall, Berkeley, CA 94706, United States
AU: Hou, Z
EM: hou@berkeley.edu
AF: University of California, Berkeley, 627 Davis Hall, Berkeley, CA 94706, United States
AU: Hermanowicz, S
EM: Hermanowicz@ce.berkeley.edu
AF: University of California, Berkeley, 627 Davis Hall, Berkeley, CA 94706, United States
AU: Mayer, U
EM: umayer@eos.ubc.ca
AF: Department of Earth and Ocean Sciences, University of British Columbia, 6339 Stores Rd, Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z4, Canada
AB: California's Central Valley contains over 640 food-processing plants, serving a multi-billion dollar agricultural industry. These processors consume approximately 7.9 x 107 m3 of water per year. Approximately 80% of these processors discharge the resulting wastewater, which is typically high in organic matter, nitrogen, and salts, to land, and many of these use land application as a treatment method. Initial investigations revealed elevated salinity levels to be the most common form of groundwater degradation near land application sites, followed by concentrations of nitrogen compounds, namely ammonia and nitrate. Enforcement actions have been taken against multiple food processors, and the regulatory boards have begun to re-examine the land disposal permitting process. This paper summarizes a study that was commissioned in support of these actions. The study has multiple components which will be reviewed briefly, including: (1) characterization of the food-processing related waste stream; (2) fate and transport of the effluent waste stream in the unsaturated zone at the land application sites; (3) fate and transport of the effluent waste stream at the regional scale; (4) predictive uncertainty due to spatial variability and data scarcity at the land application sites and at the regional scale; (5) problem mitigation through off-site and in-situ actions; (6) long-term solutions. The emphasis of the talk will be placed on presenting and demonstrating a stochastic framework for modeling the transport and attenuation of these wastes in the vadose zone and in the saturated zone, and the related site characterization needs, as affected by site conditions, water table depth, waste water application rate, and waste constituent concentrations.
UR: http://www.hilmarsep.com
DE: 1829 Groundwater hydrology
DE: 1866 Soil moisture
DE: 1869 Stochastic hydrology
DE: 1875 Vadose zone
SC: Hydrology [H]
MN: 2007 Fall Meeting