TRANSFER OF EUROPEAN COASTAL POLLUTION TO THE ARCTIC - RADIOACTIVE-TRACERS

Controlled discharges of man-made radionuclides from the nuclear repro cessing facilities at Sellafield (UK) and La Hague (France) have been utilized to trace the transport of European coastal contaminants to th e Barents Sea, the Kara Sea, the Arctic Ocean and the East Greenland C urrent. The transfer is quantified by a transfer factor (TF), calculat ed as the quotient between observed concentrations in the environment and an average discharge rate t years earlier, where t is the transpor t time. A TF value of 1-2 ng m(-3)/t yr(-1) has been found for Sellafi eld discharges in East Greenland Current Polar Water-a water mass refl ecting contaminant levels in Arctic Ocean surface water. Such transfer factors are also valid for other conservatively-behaving pollutants d ischarged to the European coastal zone. Even non-conservative particle -reactive elements (e.g. plutonium) have now been traced from European coastal waters to the Arctic.