The aim of the Working Groups is to foster collaborative research efforts through continued meetings and coordination, with a focus on data compilation, analysis, and modeling. Each Working Group has developed distinct research questions, which are being addressed through the identification, compilation, and analysis of legacy data. These efforts contribute to the development of papers and advance the understanding of Critical Zone processes in carbonates.
Working Group Leaders: Kelly Deuerling, Geography/Geology Department, University of Nebraska Omaha; Andrea Pain, Center for Environmental Science, University of Maryland
Steering Committee liaison: Jon Martin, Department of Geological Sciences, University of Florida
Description: This group investigates how water, rock, soil, gases, and plants interact to influence weathering processes, groundwater chemistry, groundwater flow, greenhouse gas emissions, and ecosystem functioning
Activities: The group has compiled legacy data on the chemical compositions of water from springs, wells, and streams in five regions around the US underlain by karst aquifers. The regions differ in depositional age, lithology, and groundwater salinity. The data are used to evaluate water-rock interactions, karstification processes, and interactions between dissolved organic carbon and oxygen to understand redox conditions.
Outcomes:
- Compilation of hundreds of thousands of solute concentration records across the targeted regions (Extracted data will be available on HydroShare)
- Initial evaluations of data, including solute cross-plots to determine sources of salinity, interactions with rock, or marine water mixing.
- Papers in preparation:
- Relative impacts on groundwater solute compositions from meteoric vs. marine sources and mineral dissolution.
- Controls on solute compositions from microbial and biological processes, focusing on redox states.
Key findings: Systematic relationships between Na, Mg, Cl, and SO4 concentrations indicate contributions from marine and rock sources. Dissolved oxygen and carbon concentrations increase with the depositional age of aquifer rocks and their hydraulic conductivity, suggesting a link to surface water and groundwater exchange rates.
Participants
Lindsey Cromwell, University of Florida
Lee Florea, Washington State Department of Natural Resources
Ellen Herman, Bucknell University
Michael Jones, Florida State University
Jenn Macalady, Penn State University
Rene Price, Florida International University