Development of a fluvial oil-particle aggregate (OPA) drift simulator to evaluate the fate and transport of contaminated sediment in rivers

Berens, John Matthew

Permalink

https://hdl.handle.net/2142/108062 Copy

Description

Title

Development of a fluvial oil-particle aggregate (OPA) drift simulator to evaluate the fate and transport of contaminated sediment in rivers

Author(s)

Berens, John Matthew

Issue Date

2020-05-15

Director of Research (if dissertation) or Advisor (if thesis)

Garcia, Marcelo H

Department of Study

Civil & Environmental Eng

Discipline

Civil Engineering

Degree Granting Institution

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Degree Name

M.S.

Degree Level

Thesis

Keyword(s)

• Oil
• Spill
• Fluvial
• Transport
• OPA
• River
• Kalamazoo
• Coagulation
• Model

Abstract

To be able to mitigate the effects of inland oil spills in freshwater environments, a fast, robust, user-friendly model is required for rapid response purposes. Being able to predict the fate and transport of oil-particle aggregates (OPA) is important for alleviating much of the long-term effects of riverine spills. A model for this purpose is developed by incorporating OPA formation algorithms from suspended sediments to an existing model that has the capability of transporting pre-formed OPA with a random walk scheme through unsteady HEC-RAS domains. For the sake of showing the importance of considering OPA formation, a range of parameters were tested with and without OPA formation. The main parameters tested in this research are the oil droplet diameter, suspended sediment grain size, and the magnitude of flow velocity. The conditions in which it is most important to consider OPA formation for accurate transport predictions are small oil droplet diameters, large sediment grain sizes, and low flow velocities. Under the inverse conditions, there is little benefit for modeling OPA formation. This knowledge will be important for users to consider while making decisions with this model for oil spill rapid response for the specific event that is being considered.

Graduation Semester

2020-05

Type of Resource

Thesis

Permalink

http://hdl.handle.net/2142/108062

Copyright and License Information

Copyright 2020 John Berens

Owning Collections