Flocculation of sediment from the Tanshui River estuary

Abstract

Experiments on the flocculation of fine-grained sediments from the Tanshui River estuary, Taiwan, were carried out. The effects of fluid shear, sediment concentration and salinity on floc growth were investigated. The ranges of these parameters were 12.5 to 400 s^-1 for the shear, 50 to 600 mg L^-1 for the sediments concentration and 0% to 100% sea water for the salinity. The results showed the following. (1) The time required to reach a steady state ranges from 2 to 44 h and median floc sizes range from 100 to 520 μm. (2) The steady-state median floc size decreases with the increase in sediment concentration. (3) The floc size increases as the shear increases. (4) Increasing the proportion of sea water from 0% to 50% decreases the floc size to one-fourth of that of freshwater flocs, and a further increase in salinity does not decrease floc size significantly. (5) The time required to reach a steady state decreases with the decrease in shear, the increase in sediment concentration and the increase in salinity. (6) The larger the steady-state flocs, the longer they take to form. Comparison of these results with those obtained in similar studies of Lake Erie sediments shows that the flocculation properties of Tanshui sediments are substantially different from those of Lake Erie sediments. Tanshui sediments are much more difficult to aggregate, but once flocs are formed they are larger. The reasons why different types of sediment behave differently should be studied further.