Mixing of brine waste in Puck Bay (the south Baltic Sea) in the light of in-situ measurements

Abstract

In the north-eastern part of Poland, the underground gas stores are being constructed by diluting salt deposits. Brine, a by-product of the technology applied, is discharged into the coastal waters of the south Baltic Sea by a system of diffusers. To assess the intensity of brine mixing in the near-field of the discharge installation, a monitoring program was carried out. The results demonstrated that under the mildly dynamic conditions of Puck Bay, the discharge of brine (saturation 250 kg m

Spreading of brine in the Puck Bay in view of in-situ measurements

“…Execution of the monitoring programme was divided into two steps: early-stage (2010 -2012), conducted to investigate the mixing of brine discharged into the coastal waters of the Puck Bay by a system of diffusers, and thus to verify theoretical assumptions made in the pre-investment study (Robakiewicz 2014(Robakiewicz , 2016. basic (2013 -), conducted to control the mixing of brine in the nearfield of discharge installation.…”

“…The position of each vertical was registered by a GPS gauge. During in-situ measurements, brine saturated to 237.07 kg/m 3 was discharged through the D1 arm at a rate of 61.1-61.4 m 3 /h, which means that the initial velocity at the nozzle was 22.20-22.45 m/s (Robakiewicz 2016). On the basis of the CTD data collected, it is possible to determine the spatial distribution of the highest salinity values in measured verticals (Figure 5 left).…”