Acid mine drainage is a common byproduct from both active and inactive mining operations that can have lasting impacts on the surrounding water ecosystem. These low pH waters have the potential to carry large concentrations of heavy metals (e.g. zinc) that can be quickly dispersed through waterflow across a watershed and cause harm to the native ecosystem. An expanding approach to understanding metal transport and the potential effects of remediation techniques in these unique systems is watershed modeling. In this study, we used the Watershed Analysis Risk Management Framework (WARMF) model to examine zinc and sediment transport and remediation across the Spring River watershed that includes the Tri-State Mining District (Oklahoma, Kansas, and Missouri). The WARMF model allowed us to look at the potential outcomes of commonly executed best management practices (BMPs) for watershed remediation that included revegetation of former chat piles, buffer strips, and sediment traps. By dividing the watershed into 264 delineated catchments, we were able to improve our understanding of where the implementation of different BMPs, or combinations of BMPs provided the greatest improvement to water quality. We found that a combination of revegetated former chat piles and introduced buffer strips caused the greatest removal of total suspended sediments and total zinc to the majority of the watershed. However, this combination of BMPs also caused the dissolved zinc concentrations to significantly increase across most of the watershed. We attribute this increase in dissolved zinc to the improved removal of suspended sediments, which caused the system to lose surfaces for the dissolved zinc to adsorb to. Overall, we determined that a mixed implementation of BMPs across the watershed would yield the greatest improvement to water quality. These results will help provide crucial information to continue the significant remediation effort occurring in the Spring River watershed region.

Modelled zinc and sediment transport of the Spring River watershed: An evaluation of best management practices for remediation

ACS Fall 2021

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