Coupled consolidation and contaminant transport model for simulating migration of contaminants through the sediment and a cap

Abstract Capping contaminated sediments in waterways is an alternate remediation technique to dredging and is typically much cheaper than dredging. When cap material is placed on top of contaminated sediment, it has both a short-term and long-term hydraulic impact on the underlying sediment. A numerical model of consolidation, based on a nonlinear finite strain theory for a consolidating fine-grained sediment bed was developed. The nonlinear equation of consolidation was solved in a material (or reduced) coordinate using an explicit finite difference numerical scheme. An one-dimensional advection–diffusion equation with sorption and decay was solved on a convective coordinate using a finite volume total variation diminishing (TVD) scheme for the contaminant concentration within the consolidating sediment. The contaminant transport model was coupled with the consolidation model. The time and space varying porosities, permeabilities, and advective velocities computed by the consolidation model were linked to the transport model at the same time level. A number of benchmark tests that are relevant to the consolidation of a fine-grained sediment were designed and tested. The relative contribution of consolidation-induced transient advective velocities on the migration of a contaminant during consolidation was also investigated. The coupled model performance was validated by simulating the transport of hazardous chemicals under consolidation in a confined aquatic disposal (CAD) site in the Lower Duwamish Waterway, Seattle.