Are Microcosms Tiny Pit Lakes?

Abstract

Microcosm experiments are frequent precursors to field trials for the treatment of acidic pit lakes using organic matter. We conducted field and microcosm experiments to test the effectiveness of hay to remediate two small, shallow acidic pit lakes. ‘West’ Lake was treated with 19 t of hay and ‘East’ Lake was untreated. Microcosms mimicked key lake trends in water quality, increasing pH and reducing metal concentrations to a greater extent and faster than the field trial. However, microcosms are not tiny pit lakes because they provide an overly optimistic picture of remediation efficacy.

RAS ID

25610

Document Type

Conference Proceeding

Date of Publication

2017

School

Mine Water and Environment Research Centre

Copyright

free_to_read

Publisher

LUT Scientific and Expertise Publications

Comments

Lund,M. A., Blanchette, M. L., Gonzalez-Pinto, J. G., Green, R., Mather, C., Kleiber, C., &Lee, S. (2017). Are Microcosms Tiny Pit Lakes?. In 13th International Mine Water Association Congress - Mine Water & Circular Economy (pp 1204-1206).

Available here.

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