Print Email Facebook Twitter Carbon monoxide as a tracer of gas transport in snow and other natural porous media Title Carbon monoxide as a tracer of gas transport in snow and other natural porous media Author Huwald, H. Selker, J.S. Tyler, S.W. Calaf, M. Van de Giesen, N.C. Parlange, M.B. Faculty Civil Engineering and Geosciences Department Water Management Date 2012-01-26 Abstract The movement of air in natural porous media is complex and challenging to measure. Yet gas transport has important implications, for instance, for the evolution of the seasonal snow cover and for water vapor transport in soil. A novel in situmulti-sensor measurement system providing high-resolution observation of gas transport in snow is demonstrated. Carbon monoxide was selected as the tracer gas for having essentially the same density as air, low background concentration, low water solubility, and for being detectable to ? 1 ppmv with small, low-cost, low-power sensors. The plume of 1% CO injections 30 cm below the snow surface was monitored using 28 sensors (4 locations, 7 depths). The CO breakthrough curves obtained at distances of 0.5–1 m were in good agreement with a simple analytical advection-diffusion model. The tracer system appears suitable for a wide range of applications in experimental soil science and hydrology addressing moisture transport and evapotranspiration processes. Subject carbon monoxideporous mediasnow To reference this document use: http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:110ef272-6dd5-4a39-a50d-93c4349c3394 DOI https://doi.org/10.1029/2011GL050247 Publisher American Geophysical Union ISSN 0094-8276 Source Geophysical Research Letters, 39 (2), 2012 Part of collection Institutional Repository Document type journal article Rights (c) 2012 American Geophysical Union Files PDF vandeGiesen_2012.pdf 604.25 KB Close viewer /islandora/object/uuid:110ef272-6dd5-4a39-a50d-93c4349c3394/datastream/OBJ/view