Chapter 6 - The Media Equation Set

Abstract

As was the case in the general equation set, Heaviside functions will be used to preclude fluxes of mass when mass is not present. This is more important here than in any other part of the model because the fluxes of mass in the media are very large compared to those in the general equation set. Thus, for example, the elemental ionic mass of a given species may be completely adsorbed in a single analytical cell within the ion exchanger, whereas in the general equation set, the soluble mass never vanishes. The strength of these mass fluxes in the media also requires a much finer discretization of the spatial domain than is required for the general equation set. The media equation set will be constructed using building block equations from both the general and the media equations. In the case of the radioactive species, for example, only the loss term (radioactive decay) will be used because media is never found in the presence of an activating neutron flux.