Trace metal-humate interactions. II. The “conservative roof” model and its application

The modelling of metal-humate interactions has been a field of active research for more than 3 decades but despite all efforts there is still far from a consensus concerning humic binding models. The authors demonstrate that a synopsis of large sets of reliable experimental data for Ca, Co, Ni, Eu, Am, Cm, Np(V) and U(VI) reveals a consistent picture of the influence of metal concentration, pH and ionic strength on metal-humate interactions. However, this consistent behaviour cannot be interpreted with high numerical accuracy by simple binding models, the need for more adjustable parameters increases proportional to the width of the experimental parameter range to be fitted. This experience triggered the proposal of a pragmatic approach for performance assessment purposes. The “conservative roof” approach does not aim to accurately model all experimental data but rather allows estimates to be made of the maximum effects on metal complexation to be expected from humic substances. A specific “conservative roof” model is applied to situations generally to be expected in deep groundwater and selected cases of interest for planned Swiss repositories of radioactive waste are discussed in detail.