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Integrated concentration statistics from river generated pollution in coastal zones

River estuaries represent one of the most valuable and nevertheless most fragile ecosystems. By their own definition they act as an interactive border between river and sea, hence obtaining characteristics of both environments and yet unique ones such as brackish water or funnel shape. On the other hand, human impact is great at such coastal ecosystem due to multiple interests involved, ranging from agricultural via transportation to recreational activities. The river generated pollution is one of the most important threats to estuary ecosystem ; hence this research investigates the potential of integrated concentration statistics as a measure of dilution and risk assessment. Previous work conducted includes the definition of pollution concentration moments and corresponding probability density functions. Hence, based on developed simple analytical solution for obtaining the moments, a more robust measure of dilution is introduced – expected mass fraction. The concept of expected mass fraction was previously used by several authors concerning the dilution processes in environmental flows. Being applied for an estuarine system for the first time, such measure is defined by spatial integration of point statistics over available volume. The result is an estimate of pollutant mass existing at some downstream distance which has the concentration above defined limit value. That kind of information gives potentially useful loading estimate when doing pollution risk assessment of the estuary ecosystem.

Estuaries, River generated pollution, Pollution concentration moments, Probability density function (PDF), Expected mass fraction (EMF), Pollution loading estimate

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