Numerical modeling of contaminated neutral drainage from a waste-rock field test cell

•Geochemical behavior of a waste-rock field test cell was modelled using MIN3P.•Nickel appears in waste rock effluent after approximately 30 years.•Sorption of nickel delays its release in effluent until sorption sites are saturated.•Simulated nickel concentration in the effluent increases for the next 100 years.•Sorption parameters for the model should be selected based on experimental data.

Contaminated drainage related to the leaching of soluble metals under near-neutral conditions, known as contaminated neutral drainage (CND), may arise when metal species are soluble at neutral pH. Such a phenomenon has been sporadically observed in effluent from the Tio mine waste-rock pile in Quebec, Canada, particularly from older sections of the pile, where Ni concentrations are increasing with time. It has been postulated that Ni is retained within the fresh waste rock as sorbed species, but as the rock ages, sorption sites become saturated and more Ni is released to the effluent. A field test program was initiated to evaluate the geochemical behavior of the waste rock. This paper presents a numerical analysis of CND generation from waste-rock field test cells including water flow and multi-component transport with geochemical reactions (e.g. sulfide oxidation, pH neutralization, and Ni sorption), using the code MIN3P. The model was able to represent the delay before Ni is seen in the effluent, as caused by sorption of Ni onto Fe-oxide particles. Once the sorption sites are saturated, the model allows Ni release into the effluent by millerite dissolution, expressed by the shrinking core model. A sensitivity analysis indicated that sorption parameters significantly affected the simulated results, so their selection should be based on sound independent field or experimental data.