Geochemical modeling has its roots in the application of fundamental chemical thermodynamics and kinetics to water-rock interactions. It truly became a modeling discipline when the first computer codes were programmed, starting in 1968 with Dr. Helgeson. Geochemical modeling was originally conceived to resolve speciation and solubility equilibria and reaction paths of geochemical systems, such as those in the natural environment or in waste disposal sites. “Applied geochemical modeling” became a mainstream science tool (i.e. to be used for wider varieties of (bio)(geo)chemical systems) when the early codes such as EQ3/EQ6 (1979), PHREEQE (1980) and MINTEQ (1984) were incorporated into publically available software such as The Geochemist's Workbench (1992), PHREEQC (1995) and Visual MINTEQ (2000). In the last two decades, software has evolved, databases have expanded, and a great number of scholars has been trained. But it is the number of applications of geochemical modeling, together with the global dissemination of the technique, that has proliferated the most. Geochemical modeling has found applications ranging from the study of leaching behaviour of solid wastes, to the removal of heavy metals from natural waters, to the long-term durability of building materials, to the geological sequestration or ocean storage of carbon dioxide, among many others. In this presentation, recent scientific literature employing geochemical modeling is reviewed, both analytically and critically. The Web of Science Core Collection was searched, and the review was concentrated in the years 2016 to 2018, totalling 847 matches, leaving out 2,509 matches from prior years. The analytical data collected includes the distribution of matches among: fields of science and engineering; academic and research institutions; leading authors; countries; and citation performance. The critical aspect of the review relates to exploring questions such as: (i) is geochemical modeling being used more often to predict experimental data or to explain experimental data (i.e. a priori or a posteriori); (ii) is geochemical modeling more often the focus of published papers, or a tool used as part of a greater study; (iii) how readily can geochemically modeled data be replicated based on the input data and methods described in published papers; (iv) are researchers pushing the boundaries of geochemical modeling, or more often just scratching the surface of this technique, born half a century ago?

Applications of geochemical modeling: Analytical and critical review of recent scientific literature

2019 Fall National Meeting

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.