StormFlux: Effect of Storm Babet on Pollution Fluxes from Remobilised Mine Wastes

处置在沿海地区的历史废物越来越容易通过侵蚀和海水淹没而重新活化，包括沿诺森布里亚河流域地区海岸倾倒的约2000公顷未受保护的采矿废物。2023年10月18日至21日的巴贝特风暴非常不寻常，因为持续的东风造成了连续六次涨潮平均为4米的极高海浪。这导致东北海岸线上的矿山废料受到大范围海水洪水和侵蚀的影响。这项计划旨在以达勒姆海岸的海岸废物堆填区Seaham海滩为个案研究地点，探讨破坏性风暴对海岸废物堆填区的地貌行为的影响，以及迁移后的物质可能流入邻近生态系统的污染通量。现在迫切需要对这些新暴露的废物进行采样和分析，同时对地貌变化进行进一步测量，以确定(1)新暴露的废物的污染潜力和地球化学，(2)巴贝特风暴期间污染物金属进入北海的绝对通量，以及(3)风暴事件对邻近海滩环境的短期和中期影响。鉴于这些海滩沉积废物(如新暴露的氧化废物)的地貌和地球化学性质的快速变化，现在迫切需要进行这项研究，而废物最显著的变化及其动员的影响是最明显的。这一信息将有助于让地方和国家利益攸关方了解类似的无保护沿海废物的潜在行为及其对近岸海洋社区的可能影响。更广泛地说，这些数据将评估泥沙侵蚀如何应对气候变化引起的更强烈的风暴事件，可能导致废物动员的增加；这一信息对于重新评估海岸线管理计划至关重要，包括考虑改善海防。

Historical wastes disposed in coastal zones are increasingly vulnerable to remobilisation via erosion and seawater inundation including ~2000 Ha of unprotected mining wastes dumped along the Northumbrian River Basin District Coast. Storm Babet, 18-21 Oct 2023, was highly unusual in that prolonged easterly winds caused extraordinarily high waves averaging >4m for six consecutive high tides. This led to mine wastes on the NE coastline being affected by extensive seawater flooding and erosion. This project aims to use Seaham Beach, a coastal waste site on the Co. Durham coast, as a case study location to explore the impact of damaging storms on coastal waste sites in terms of geomorphological behaviour, and potential pollution fluxes into adjacent ecosystems from the remobilised material. There is now an urgent need to sample and analyse this freshly exposed waste, alongside further measurements of geomorphic change, to determine (1) the pollution potential and geochemistry of the newly exposed waste, (2) the absolute flux of contaminant metals to the North Sea that occurred during Storm Babet, and (3) the short- to medium- term impacts of the storm event on adjacent beach environments. Given the rapidly changing geomorphic and geochemical nature of these beach-deposited wastes (e.g. as newly exposed wastes oxidise), there is a pressing need to undertake this research now, while the most significant changes to the waste, and impacts from its mobilisation, are most evident. This information will help inform local and national stakeholders on the potential behaviour of similar unprotected coastal wastes and their possible impacts on nearshore marine communities. More generally the data will assess how sediment erosion, in response to more intense storm events due to climate change, may lead to increasing waste mobilisation; this information is vital for re-evaluation of shoreline management plans, including consideration of improved sea defences.