In 1976, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) began studies of unsaturated zone hydrology at a site in the Amargosa Desert near Beatty, Nevada, as part of the USGS Low-Level Radioactive Waste Program. The site is near disposal trenches for civilian waste.
Over the years, USGS investigations at the Amargosa Desert Research Site (ADRS) have provided long-term "benchmark" information about the hydraulic characteristics and soil-water movement for both natural-site conditions and simulated waste-site conditions in an arid environment. In 1995, as a result of finding elevated concentrations of tritium and carbon-14 in the unsaturated zone beneath the ADRS, the scope of research was broadened to improve understanding of processes affecting contaminant transport and release to environmental receptors. The ADRS was incorporated into the USGS Toxic Substances Hydrology Program in 1997. The site serves as a field laboratory for multidisciplinary, collaborative research that involves scientists from research institutes, universities, National laboratories, and the USGS.
Current Research
Field-intensive research on water, gas, and chemical movement in the environment is being supported by multiple lines of data:
- Weather, evapotranspiration, and plant data
- Subsurface moisture, temperature, gas, and ground-water monitoring
- Soil and sediment properties; geology; geophysics; and microbiology
Mixed-waste, point-source contaminant studies include:
- Tritium
- Radiocarbon
- Volatile-organic compounds
- Mercury
Natural, non-point-source contaminant studies include:
- Perchlorate
Perchlorate has emerged as an environmental contaminant of concern in drinking water and food. Natural perchlorate forms in the atmosphere and soil, plant, and atmospheric-deposition samples are being used to evaluate factors controlling its accumulation and cycling in desert environments.
Field and laboratory data are being integrated with numerical modeling to develop predictive tools for assessing chemical transport and fate in the environment.
Methods are being developed to improve characterization of physical, chemical, and biological factors that control hydrologic and chemical-transport processes.
Overall Research Objectives
- Improve quantitative understanding of arid-site processes affecting contaminant transport and release to environmental receptors by integrating existing and new information into physically based numerical and analytical models.
- Fill gaps in present knowledge of soil–plant–atmosphere interactions in arid regions with respect to water, gas, and contaminant transport. Explain effects of such interactions on transport processes and on environmental health through analyses of spatial and temporal heterogeneities and trends, and through targeted data collection.
- Develop efficient methods for characterizing anthropogenically introduced and naturally occurring contaminant distributions in order to test theories of flow and transport processes at the field scale.
Use of Results
Results of studies at the Amargosa Desert Research Site (ADRS) are contributing to the characterization and understanding of arid-site processes. The findings have far reaching implications for water resources management in such environments, both in terms of waste disposal and of ground-water availability. Long-term, benchmark information and the testing and development of methods and models at the ADRS have helped others in their characterization of flow and transport processes at other arid sites in the United States and the World.
"I just read the article, "Plant-Based Plume-Scale Mapping of Tritium Contamination in Desert Soils," and wanted to express my appreciation. This is the first time anyone has mapped subsurface vapor-phase tritium migration using plants, but I doubt it will be the last. The technique that your team worked out, and the quality of the verification that was conducted, virtually ensure that this method will be used again and again. Providing a new technique that saves both time and money without sacrificing data quality is a real contribution, and one which may improve characterization of many environmental sites."
Steve Rock, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, written communication, 2005
"I have found the paleohydrologic investigations of the USGS involving sub-soil nitrates and chlorides in arid regions to be both instructive and relevant to my current research endeavors with perchlorate and oxy-anions."
Gregory Harvey, Environmental Safety and Health Division, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, written communication, 2004.
"I would like to thank all of the ADRS research team, and especially you for the cooperation and help that allowed us to perform our study at the ADRS. The ADRS truly is serving as a field laboratory for the study of vadose-zone hydrology in arid regions. The long-term information and basic data gathered at the site is of benefit to many researchers that have a wide variety of interests. The generous data sharing and the up-to-date website are not only saving money and time for those doing research at the ADRS, but are also accelerating improved understanding hydrologic processes."
Weiquan Dong, Research Assistant and Ph.D. candidate, Department of Geoscience, Univ. of Nevada, Las Vegas, May 20, 2004
"The ADRS studies provide valuable guidelines that help establish regulatory minimums on demonstrations of adequate design, numerical modeling, and performance monitoring for alternative evapotranspiration (ET) landfill caps. The high quality, in-situ data on long-term soil- water movement verifies the realistic range of critical model parameters for the dry and sparse-vegetation conditions that often prevail in parts of Montana. The ADRS studies also provide insights on the effects of plants and soil properties on cap performance, and suggest that ET cap performance may actually improve over the 30 years of landfill post-closure care."
Tim Stepp, Montana Department of Environmental Quality, written communication, 2002.
"Research activities at the Amargosa Desert Research Site are of great inspiration on the aspect of waste disposal in arid environments, of which so little is known. Results of the Amargosa Desert studies will be of great help in our work to identify suitable sites and to develop guidelines for waste disposal in Namibia, a country with a highly variable climatic setting and large areas that receive very limited precipitation, such as the Namib and Kalahari Deserts."
Sindila Mwiya, Engineering and Environment Subdivision, Geological Survey of Namibia, written communication, 2001.
"Soil-water measurement technology developed at the Amargosa Desert Research Site is being used to assess the hydrologic performance of an evapotranspiration landfill cover at the US Army Fort Carson military base, Colorado Springs, Colorado. The techniques provide a means to assess the performance of unconventional landfill covers that can be constructed at a considerably lower cost than conventional covers."
Patrick McGuire, Senior Soil Scientist, Earth Tech, Sheboygan, WI and Donald Moses, Chief, HTW Geotechnical Section, Engineering Division, US Army Corps of Engineers, Omaha, NE, written communication, 2001.
This work is of particular interest to regulators, U.S. Departments of Defense and Energy, and industry professionals because it is the first alternative landfill-cover design to be approved by the state of Colorado.
Under a contract from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) has requested ADRS multiple-year meteorologic and hydrologic data for use in the development of numerical models for calculating water movement through the unsaturated zone at low-level radioactive waste sites. Water-flux meters designed by PNNL have also been installed at the ADRS in a collaborative effort (1) to test, under hyper-arid climate conditions, the performance of meters which are being used to document net water infiltration into waste covers at the Hanford site and (2) to support the ADRS study of vadose-zone transport. The water-flux meter installation and testing effort is supported by U.S. Department of Energy (SUBCON) and U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission funding. (Glendon Gee, Senior Staff Scientist, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Richland, WA, personal communication, 2001).
Additional web pages for this project are listed below.
Amargosa Desert Research Site Collaborator Information
Amargosa Desert Research Site Research Team
Amargosa Desert Research Site Description
Below are data or web applications associated with this project.
Selected Evapotranspiration Data, Amargosa Desert Research Site, Nye County, Nevada, 7/5/2011-1/1/2017
Most publications for research at the ADRS are listed below. Citations for additional publications can be found here:
Supplemental Amargosa Desert Research Station Publications
Emerging and historical contaminants detected in desert rodents collected near a low‐level radioactive waste site
Spatial fingerprinting of biogenic and anthropogenic volatile organic compounds in an arid unsaturated zone
Unsaturated zone CO2, CH4, and δ13C-CO2 at an arid region low-level radioactive waste disposal site
Groundwater discharge by evapotranspiration, flow of water in unsaturated soil, and stable isotope water sourcing in areas of sparse vegetation, Amargosa Desert, Nye County, Nevada
Steady state fractionation of heavy noble gas isotopes in a deep unsaturated zone
Global patterns and environmental controls of perchlorate and nitrate co-occurrence in arid and semi-arid environments
Multimodel analysis of anisotropic diffusive tracer-gas transport in a deep arid unsaturated zone
Soil, plant, and terrain effects on natural perchlorate distribution in a desert landscape
Field-scale sulfur hexafluoride tracer experiment to understand long distance gas transport in the deep unsaturated zone
Tritium plume dynamics in the shallow unsaturated zone in an arid environment
On the conversion of tritium units to mass fractions for hydrologic applications
Micrometeorological, evapotranspiration, and soil-moisture data at the Amargosa Desert Research site in Nye County near Beatty, Nevada, 2006-11
- Overview
In 1976, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) began studies of unsaturated zone hydrology at a site in the Amargosa Desert near Beatty, Nevada, as part of the USGS Low-Level Radioactive Waste Program. The site is near disposal trenches for civilian waste.
Over the years, USGS investigations at the Amargosa Desert Research Site (ADRS) have provided long-term "benchmark" information about the hydraulic characteristics and soil-water movement for both natural-site conditions and simulated waste-site conditions in an arid environment. In 1995, as a result of finding elevated concentrations of tritium and carbon-14 in the unsaturated zone beneath the ADRS, the scope of research was broadened to improve understanding of processes affecting contaminant transport and release to environmental receptors. The ADRS was incorporated into the USGS Toxic Substances Hydrology Program in 1997. The site serves as a field laboratory for multidisciplinary, collaborative research that involves scientists from research institutes, universities, National laboratories, and the USGS.
Current Research
USGS scientist Jonathan Arthur sampling at the Amargosa Desert Research Site. (Credit: Brian Andraski, USGS. Public domain.) Field-intensive research on water, gas, and chemical movement in the environment is being supported by multiple lines of data:
- Weather, evapotranspiration, and plant data
- Subsurface moisture, temperature, gas, and ground-water monitoring
- Soil and sediment properties; geology; geophysics; and microbiology
Mixed-waste, point-source contaminant studies include:
- Tritium
- Radiocarbon
- Volatile-organic compounds
- Mercury
Using a magnometer in the trench at the Amargosa Desert Research Station. (Credit: Brian Andraski, USGS. Public domain.) Natural, non-point-source contaminant studies include:
- Perchlorate
Perchlorate has emerged as an environmental contaminant of concern in drinking water and food. Natural perchlorate forms in the atmosphere and soil, plant, and atmospheric-deposition samples are being used to evaluate factors controlling its accumulation and cycling in desert environments.
Field and laboratory data are being integrated with numerical modeling to develop predictive tools for assessing chemical transport and fate in the environment.
Methods are being developed to improve characterization of physical, chemical, and biological factors that control hydrologic and chemical-transport processes.
Overall Research Objectives
- Improve quantitative understanding of arid-site processes affecting contaminant transport and release to environmental receptors by integrating existing and new information into physically based numerical and analytical models.
- Fill gaps in present knowledge of soil–plant–atmosphere interactions in arid regions with respect to water, gas, and contaminant transport. Explain effects of such interactions on transport processes and on environmental health through analyses of spatial and temporal heterogeneities and trends, and through targeted data collection.
- Develop efficient methods for characterizing anthropogenically introduced and naturally occurring contaminant distributions in order to test theories of flow and transport processes at the field scale.
Evapotranspiration station at the Amargosa Desert Research Site. (Public domain.) Use of Results
Results of studies at the Amargosa Desert Research Site (ADRS) are contributing to the characterization and understanding of arid-site processes. The findings have far reaching implications for water resources management in such environments, both in terms of waste disposal and of ground-water availability. Long-term, benchmark information and the testing and development of methods and models at the ADRS have helped others in their characterization of flow and transport processes at other arid sites in the United States and the World.
"I just read the article, "Plant-Based Plume-Scale Mapping of Tritium Contamination in Desert Soils," and wanted to express my appreciation. This is the first time anyone has mapped subsurface vapor-phase tritium migration using plants, but I doubt it will be the last. The technique that your team worked out, and the quality of the verification that was conducted, virtually ensure that this method will be used again and again. Providing a new technique that saves both time and money without sacrificing data quality is a real contribution, and one which may improve characterization of many environmental sites."
Steve Rock, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, written communication, 2005
"I have found the paleohydrologic investigations of the USGS involving sub-soil nitrates and chlorides in arid regions to be both instructive and relevant to my current research endeavors with perchlorate and oxy-anions."
Gregory Harvey, Environmental Safety and Health Division, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, written communication, 2004.
"I would like to thank all of the ADRS research team, and especially you for the cooperation and help that allowed us to perform our study at the ADRS. The ADRS truly is serving as a field laboratory for the study of vadose-zone hydrology in arid regions. The long-term information and basic data gathered at the site is of benefit to many researchers that have a wide variety of interests. The generous data sharing and the up-to-date website are not only saving money and time for those doing research at the ADRS, but are also accelerating improved understanding hydrologic processes."
Weiquan Dong, Research Assistant and Ph.D. candidate, Department of Geoscience, Univ. of Nevada, Las Vegas, May 20, 2004
"The ADRS studies provide valuable guidelines that help establish regulatory minimums on demonstrations of adequate design, numerical modeling, and performance monitoring for alternative evapotranspiration (ET) landfill caps. The high quality, in-situ data on long-term soil- water movement verifies the realistic range of critical model parameters for the dry and sparse-vegetation conditions that often prevail in parts of Montana. The ADRS studies also provide insights on the effects of plants and soil properties on cap performance, and suggest that ET cap performance may actually improve over the 30 years of landfill post-closure care."
Tim Stepp, Montana Department of Environmental Quality, written communication, 2002.
"Research activities at the Amargosa Desert Research Site are of great inspiration on the aspect of waste disposal in arid environments, of which so little is known. Results of the Amargosa Desert studies will be of great help in our work to identify suitable sites and to develop guidelines for waste disposal in Namibia, a country with a highly variable climatic setting and large areas that receive very limited precipitation, such as the Namib and Kalahari Deserts."
Sindila Mwiya, Engineering and Environment Subdivision, Geological Survey of Namibia, written communication, 2001.
"Soil-water measurement technology developed at the Amargosa Desert Research Site is being used to assess the hydrologic performance of an evapotranspiration landfill cover at the US Army Fort Carson military base, Colorado Springs, Colorado. The techniques provide a means to assess the performance of unconventional landfill covers that can be constructed at a considerably lower cost than conventional covers."
Patrick McGuire, Senior Soil Scientist, Earth Tech, Sheboygan, WI and Donald Moses, Chief, HTW Geotechnical Section, Engineering Division, US Army Corps of Engineers, Omaha, NE, written communication, 2001.
This work is of particular interest to regulators, U.S. Departments of Defense and Energy, and industry professionals because it is the first alternative landfill-cover design to be approved by the state of Colorado.
Under a contract from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) has requested ADRS multiple-year meteorologic and hydrologic data for use in the development of numerical models for calculating water movement through the unsaturated zone at low-level radioactive waste sites. Water-flux meters designed by PNNL have also been installed at the ADRS in a collaborative effort (1) to test, under hyper-arid climate conditions, the performance of meters which are being used to document net water infiltration into waste covers at the Hanford site and (2) to support the ADRS study of vadose-zone transport. The water-flux meter installation and testing effort is supported by U.S. Department of Energy (SUBCON) and U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission funding. (Glendon Gee, Senior Staff Scientist, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Richland, WA, personal communication, 2001).
- Science
Additional web pages for this project are listed below.
Amargosa Desert Research Site Collaborator Information
A USGS goal, under the auspices of the Toxic Substances Hydrology (Toxics) Program, is to provide and maintain the Amargosa Desert Research Site (ADRS) as a field laboratory that will bring together scientists from various disciplines, agencies, and universities for focused study of processes that affect migration and fate of contaminants in a complex (i.e., real-world) setting. The main purpose...Amargosa Desert Research Site Research Team
The multidisciplinary research team is made up of scientists from research institutes, universities, National laboratories, and the USGS. The USGS co-leaders for the team are Brian J. Andraski (ADRS Coordinator, Nevada Water Science Center) and David A. Stonestrom (National Research Program, California).Amargosa Desert Research Site Description
The Amargosa Desert Research Site (ADRS), in the northern Mojave Desert, is about 20 km east of Death Valley National Park. Recognizing the paucity of information on unsaturated-zone hydrology in arid regions, the USGS, in 1983, established the ADRS through agreements with the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the State of Nevada. The ADRS serves as a field laboratory for the study of arid-land... - Data
Below are data or web applications associated with this project.
Selected Evapotranspiration Data, Amargosa Desert Research Site, Nye County, Nevada, 7/5/2011-1/1/2017
Selected evapotranspiration data were collected from 7/5/2011 to 1/1/2017 at the Amargosa Desert Research Site (ADRS, https://nevada.usgs.gov/adrs/) in support of ongoing research to improve the understanding of hydrologic and contaminant-transport processes in arid environments. The data presented in this data release includes 30-minute and daily evapotranspiration and associated energy-balance f - Publications
Most publications for research at the ADRS are listed below. Citations for additional publications can be found here:
Supplemental Amargosa Desert Research Station Publications
Filter Total Items: 87Emerging and historical contaminants detected in desert rodents collected near a low‐level radioactive waste site
In an effort to determine contaminant presence, concentrations, and movement from a low‐level radioactive waste (LLRW) burial disposal site to ecosystems in the surrounding area, a study was developed to assess concentrations of per‐ and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), and tritium. To complete this assessment small mammals, vegetation, soil, and insect samplesAuthorsRyan S. Cleary, Adcharee Karnjanapiboonwong, William A. Thompson, Steven J. Lasee, Seenivasan Sabbiah, Ronald Kauble, Brian J. Andraski, Todd A. AndersonSpatial fingerprinting of biogenic and anthropogenic volatile organic compounds in an arid unsaturated zone
Subsurface volatile organic compounds (VOCs) can pose risks to human and environmental health and mediate biological processes. VOCs have both anthropogenic and biogenic origins, but the relative importance of these sources has not been explored in subsurface environments. This study synthesizes 17 years of VOC data from the Amargosa Desert Research Site (ADRS) with the goal of improving understanAuthorsChristopher Green, Wentai Luo, Christopher H. Conaway, Karl B. Haase, Ronald J. Baker, Brian J. AndraskiUnsaturated zone CO2, CH4, and δ13C-CO2 at an arid region low-level radioactive waste disposal site
Elevated tritium, radiocarbon, Hg, and volatile organic compounds associated with low-level radioactive waste (LLRW) at the USGS Amargosa Desert Research Site (ADRS) have stimulated research on factors and processes that affect contaminant gas distribution and transport. Consequently, we examined the sources, mixing, and biogeochemistry of CO2 and CH4, two additional important species in the unsatAuthorsChristopher H. Conaway, Michelle Ann Walvoord, Randall B. Thomas, Christopher Green, R.J. Baker, James J. Thordsen, David A. Stonestrom, Brian J. AndraskiGroundwater discharge by evapotranspiration, flow of water in unsaturated soil, and stable isotope water sourcing in areas of sparse vegetation, Amargosa Desert, Nye County, Nevada
This report documents methodology and results of a study to evaluate groundwater discharge by evapotranspiration (GWET) in sparsely vegetated areas of Amargosa Desert and improve understanding of hydrologic-continuum processes controlling groundwater discharge. Evapotranspiration and GWET rates were computed and characterized at three sites over 2 years using a combination of micrometeorological,AuthorsMichael T. Moreo, Brian J. Andraski, C. Amanda GarciaSteady state fractionation of heavy noble gas isotopes in a deep unsaturated zone
To explore steady state fractionation processes in the unsaturated zone (UZ), we measured argon, krypton, and xenon isotope ratios throughout a ∼110 m deep UZ at the United States Geological Survey (USGS) Amargosa Desert Research Site (ADRS) in Nevada, USA. Prior work has suggested that gravitational settling should create a nearly linear increase in heavy-to-light isotope ratios toward the bottomAuthorsAlan M. Seltzer, Jeffrey P. Severinghaus, Brian J. Andraski, David A. StonestromGlobal patterns and environmental controls of perchlorate and nitrate co-occurrence in arid and semi-arid environments
Natural perchlorate (ClO4−) is of increasing interest due to its wide-spread occurrence on Earth and Mars, yet little information exists on the relative abundance of ClO4− compared to other major anions, its stability, or long-term variations in production that may impact the observed distributions. Our objectives were to evaluate the occurrence and fate of ClO4− in groundwater and soils/caliche iAuthorsW Andrew Jackson, John K. Böhlke, Brian J. Andraski, Lynne S. Fahlquist, Laura M. Bexfield, Frank D. Eckardt, John B. Gates, Alfonso F. Davila, Christopher P. McKay, Balaji Rao, Ritesh Sevanthi, Srinath Rajagopalan, Nubia Estrada, Neil C. Sturchio, Paul B. Hatzinger, Todd A. Anderson, Greta J. Orris, Julio L. Betancourt, David A. Stonestrom, Claudio Latorre, Yanhe Li, Gregory J. HarveyMultimodel analysis of anisotropic diffusive tracer-gas transport in a deep arid unsaturated zone
Gas transport in the unsaturated zone affects contaminant flux and remediation, interpretation of groundwater travel times from atmospheric tracers, and mass budgets of environmentally important gases. Although unsaturated zone transport of gases is commonly treated as dominated by diffusion, the characteristics of transport in deep layered sediments remain uncertain. In this study, we use a multiAuthorsChristopher T. Green, Michelle Ann Walvoord, Brian J. Andraski, Robert G. Striegl, David A. StonestromSoil, plant, and terrain effects on natural perchlorate distribution in a desert landscape
Perchlorate (ClO4−) is a contaminant that occurs naturally throughout the world, but little is known about its distribution and interactions in terrestrial ecosystems. The objectives of this Amargosa Desert, Nevada study were to determine (i) the local-scale distribution of shallow-soil (0–30 cm) ClO4− with respect to shrub proximity (far and near) in three geomorphic settings (shoulder slope, fooAuthorsBrian J. Andraski, W.A. Jackson, Toby L. Welborn, John Karl Böhlke, Ritesh Sevanthi, David A. StonestromField-scale sulfur hexafluoride tracer experiment to understand long distance gas transport in the deep unsaturated zone
A gas-tracer test in a deep arid unsaturated zone demonstrates that standard estimates of effective diffusivity from sediment properties allow a reasonable first-cut assessment of gas contaminant transport. Apparent anomalies in historic transport behavior at this and other waste disposal sites may result from factors other than nonreactive gas transport properties. A natural gradient SF6 tracer eAuthorsMichelle Ann Walvoord, Brian J. Andraski, Christopher T. Green, David A. Stonestrom, Robert G. StrieglTritium plume dynamics in the shallow unsaturated zone in an arid environment
The spatiotemporal variability of a tritium plume in the shallow unsaturated zone and the mechanisms controlling its transport were evaluated during a 10-yr study. Plume movement was minimal and its mass declined by 68%. Upward-directed diffusive-vapor tritium fluxes and radioactive decay accounted for most of the observed plume-mass declines.Effective isolation of tritium (3H) and other contaminaAuthorsS.R. Maples, Brian J. Andraski, David A. Stonestrom, C.A. Cooper, G. Pohll, R. L. MichelOn the conversion of tritium units to mass fractions for hydrologic applications
We develop a general equation for converting laboratory-reported tritium levels, expressed either as concentrations (tritium isotope number fractions) or mass-based specific activities, to mass fractions in aqueous systems. Assuming that all tritium is in the form of monotritiated water simplifies the derivation and is shown to be reasonable for most environmental settings encountered in practice.AuthorsDavid A. Stonestrom, Brian J. Andraski, Clay A. Cooper, Charles J. Mayers, Robert L. MichelMicrometeorological, evapotranspiration, and soil-moisture data at the Amargosa Desert Research site in Nye County near Beatty, Nevada, 2006-11
This report describes micrometeorological, evapotranspiration, and soil-moisture data collected since 2006 at the Amargosa Desert Research Site adjacent to a low-level radio-active waste and hazardous chemical waste facility near Beatty, Nevada. Micrometeorological data include precipitation, solar radiation, net radiation, air temperature, relative humidity, saturated and ambient vapor pressure,AuthorsJonathan M. Arthur, Michael J. Johnson, C. Justin Mayers, Brian J. Andraski