Uranium in waters and aquifer rocks at the Nevada Test Site, Nye County, Nevada

Previous chemical, geological, and hydrological information describing the physical and chemical environment of the Nevada Test Site (a Federal reserve for the testing of nuclear explosive devices) has been combined with new radiochemical and isotope data for water and rock samples in order to explain the behavior of uranium during alteration of thick sequences of rhyolitic volcanic rocks and associated volcaniclastic sediments. A model is proposed in which uranium mobility is controlled by two competing processes. Uranium is liberated from the volcanic rocks through dissolution of the glassy constituents and is carried in solution as a uranyl carbonate complex. Uranium is subsequently removed from solution by adsorption on secondary oxides of iron, titanium, and manganese, as observed in fission-track maps of aquifer rocks. The model explains the poor correlation of dissolved uranium with depth within tuffaceous sequences in which percolation of ground water is predominantly downward. Good positive correlation of dissolved uranium with dissolved Na, total dissolved solids, and total carbonate supports the glass dissolution model, while inverse correlation of dissolved uranium with U²³⁴/U²³⁸ ratios of waters implies uranium is being absorbed by a relatively insoluble, surficial phase. Alpha radioactivity of Test Site water is primarily caused by high U²³⁴ contents, and beta activity is highly correlated with dissolved K (K⁴⁰). Small amounts of dissolved radium, Pb²¹⁰, and Po²¹⁰ are present but no evidence was found for alpha activity sources related to nuclear testing (Pu, U²³⁵ ). A filtered but unacidified carbonate solution of uranium was found to be stable (± 10 percent of original U concentration) for years when stored in acid-washed polyethylene bottles.