# Using geochemical fingerprinting to track the dispersion of radioactive contamination along coastal catchments of the Fukushima Prefecture

Hugo Lepage, J. Patrick Laceby, Olivier Evrard, Yuichi Onda, Caroline

Chartin, Irène Lefèvre, Philippe Bonté, Sophie Ayrault

► To cite this version:

Hugo Lepage, J. Patrick Laceby, Olivier Evrard, Yuichi Onda, Caroline Chartin, et al.. Using geo-chemical fingerprinting to track the dispersion of radioactive contamination along coastal catchments of the Fukushima Prefecture. EGU General Assembly, Apr 2015, Vienne, Austria. pp.EGU2015-5636. cea-02648114

HAL Id: cea-02648114

https://cea.hal.science/cea-02648114

Submitted on 29 May 2020

HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access
archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci-
entific research documents, whether they are pub-
lished or not. The documents may come from
teaching and research institutions in France or
abroad, or from public or private research centers.

L'archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est
destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents
scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non,
émanant des établissements d'enseignement et de
recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires
publics ou privés.

<figure><img src="image_1.png" /></figure>

Distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
# Using geochemical fingerprinting to track the dispersion of radioactive contamination along coastal catchments of the Fukushima Prefecture

Hugo Lepage (1), J. Patrick Laceby (1), Olivier Evrard (1), Yuichi Onda (2), Chartin Caroline (3), Irène Lefèvre (1), Philippe Bonté (1), and Sophie Ayrault (1)

(1) Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l'Environnement (LSCE/IPSL), Unité Mixte de Recherche 8212 (CEA, CNRS, UVSQ), Gif-sur-Yvette, France (hugo.lepage@lsce.ipsl.fr), (2) Center for Research in Isotopes and Environmental Dynamics (CRIED), University of Tsukuba, 1-1-1 Tennodai, Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-8572, Japan, (3) George Lemaître Centre for Earth and Climate Research, Earth & Life Institute, Université catholique de Louvain, Louvain-la-Neuve (Belgium)

Several coastal catchments located in the vicinity of the Fukushima Dai-Ichi Power Plant were impacted contaminated fallout in March 2011. Following the accident, typhoons and snowmelt runoff events transfer radiocesium contamination through the coastal floodplains and ultimately to the Pacific Ocean. Therefore it is important to understand the location and relative contribution of different erosion sources in order to manage radiocesium transfer within these coastal catchments and the cumulative export of radiocesium to the Pacific Ocean. Here we present a sediment fingerprinting approach to determine the relative contributions of sediment from different soil types to sediment transported throughout two coastal riverine systems. The sediment fingerprinting technique presented utilizes differences in the elemental geochemistry of the distinct soil types to determine their relative contributions to sediment sampled in riverine systems. This research is important as it furthers our understanding of dominant erosion sources in the region which will help with ongoing decontamination and monitoring efforts pertaining to the management of fallout radiocesium migration in the region.