Fort Wainwright
Hydrological Data Network

Chemistry Data

Basic Geochemistry Sampling Program

Environmental regulations often focus on measurements of chemicals, which are viewed are harmful and have regulatory limits associated with them. An understanding of basic water chemistry is still needed for many of the interpretive, design, and evaluation phases of environmental projects. The data collected under this network is useful for all the various environmental programs on Fort Wainwright, as well as drinking water issues, evaluation of dewatering impacts, and ecological assessments and monitoring.

How is this data used?

The geochemistry between the bedrock aquifer, alluvial aquifer, and Chena River are all different. By looking at inorganic chemistry data, users can investigate the amount of mixing taking place at the boundaries of these different water sources. Ground-water models currently being used do not use this data directly, instead the data is used to evaluate model simulations. For example, if the wells in the Birch Hill OU3 area indicate the flux coming up from bedrock, and is being diluted by one third in the upper 20 feet above the contact, then the ground-water model simulations should show the same processes taking place. If the model simulations do not show this, then the ground-water model would need to be re-evaluated. The predictive use of ground-water models are limited if model simulations do not coincide with other forms of data and process understanding.

Operations of Air-Sparging and Vapor-Extraction systems have to take into account factors such as air permeability, depth to ground-water, soil moisture levels, and temperature conditions. The design of treatment systems should assume some average condition, but ongoing evaluations of systems performance, estimates of impacted zones around extraction wells, and other estimates of system performance need to use actual conditions. Cyclic water tables (seasonal and annual variations) impact the evaluation of system performance and required time to meet operational goals. It is also important to know the range of conditions in temperature and moisture, and how long extremes last. For example, if soils are very wet (saturation level) for a long time, then the potential for aerobic decomposition and changes vapor-sparging system performance is severely limited. The addition of nutrients for enhancing natural-attenuation processes is very dependant on the amount of unsaturated-zone moisture content. If moisture levels are too low, addition of nutrients can create toxic conditions for soil micro-organisms. Low water contents can even be a limiting factor for microbial growth and limit the impact of any nutrient additions.

Water-quality data for observation wells in the Fort Wainwright data network:

The following Excel files contain water-quality data for the basic geochemical monitoring network. Each file contains the same data. but is either organized based on all data for a site being listed together, or all data for a sampling event being listed together in table forms.

Chemistry-Data Excel Files

Organized by Sampling Dates, 82KB

Organized by Sampling Sites, 150KB

Jerry Williams
mailto:jwilliams@ensr.com
ENSR
3536 International Way;
Fairbanks, Alaska 99701;
Tel: (907) 452-5700, Fax: (907) 452-1912

Larry D. Hinzman
mailto:ffldh@uaf.edu
Water and Environmental Research Center;
University of Alaska Fairbanks;
Fairbanks, Alaska 99775;
Tel: (907) 474-7331, Fax: (907) 474-7979

Michael R. Lilly
mailto:mlilly@arsc.edu
Arctic Region Supercomputing Center;
University of Alaska Fairbanks;
Fairbanks, Alaska 99775;
Tel: (907) 479-8891, Fax: (907) 479-8893

URL: http://ine.uaf.edu/werc/projects/ftww/chemdata/chemdata.html