Fukushima Radiocesium Fallout and Glaciochemistry in Arctic Snow Pits

Glaciochemical profiles of 134Cs and 137Cs concentrations, stable water isotopes (delta 18O and delta deuterium), and trace element concentrations (Sr, Cd, Cs, Ba, La, Ce, Pr, Pb, Bi, U, As, Li, Al, S, Ca, Ti, V, Cr, Mn, Fe, Co, Na, Mg, Cu, Zn, K) from three Arctic locations: 1) Mt. Hunter summit plateau in Denali National Park (62.94 N, 151.09 W, 3900 m elevation), collected on June 7, 2011; 2) 2Barrel site near Camp Century on the NW Greenland Ice Sheet (76.93 N, 63.12 W, 1685 m elevation), collected on July 8, 2011; and 3) Summit Station, Greenland (72.58 N, 38.45 W, 3200 m elevation), collected on July 21, 2011. Each snow pit spans more than 1 year of snow accumulation, and shows evidence of 134Cs and 137Cs deposition from the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power plant meltdown in Japan on March 11-19, 2011. The meltdown resulted from the March 11, 2011 M9.0 Tohoku megathrust earthquake and tsunami. Radiocesium was quantified using a Canberra 3523 Ge-detector at Dartmouth College. Radiocesium samples were processed using the ammonium phosphomolybdate (AMP) absorption method (Baskaran et al., 2009). 134Cs activities have been decay corrected to March 11, 2011. Trace element concentrations were measured on the University of Maine Climate Change Institute Finnigan ELEMENT2 ICP-MS, and stable water isotope ratios were measured on a Picarro L1102-i Liquid Water Analyzer in the Iowa State University Stable Isotope Laboratory.