Carl Steefel obtained his B.A. in English Literature, his M.S. in Geology, and his Ph.D. in Geochemistry (1992).  He has over 20 years of experience in developing models for multicomponent reactive transport in porous media and applying them to topics in reactive contaminant transport and water-rock interaction.  He has developed the first routine for multicomponent nucleation and crystal size distributions in the Earth Sciences (Steefel and Van Cappellen, 1990)  and the first multicomponent, multi-dimensional  code for simulating water-rock interaction in non-isothermal environments (Steefel and Lasaga, 1994).  He has also worked extensively in applying reactive transport modeling to natural systems, including hydrothermal, contaminant, chemical weathering, and marine environments.  More recently, he has worked on laboratory experiments and post-experiment modeling of a variety of laboratory (Steefel et al., 2003) and field studies (Steefel, 2004) focused on contaminant transport.  A second focus has been on reactive transport modeling of microbially-mediated reaction pathways in marine environments (Giambalvo et al., 2002; Maher et al., 2006). 

Carl Steefel is also the principal developer of the multicomponent reactive transport software package CRUNCH.

CV for Carl Steefel (pdf)

Research Interests

• Reactive contaminant transport: Contaminant migration in groundwater and the vadose zone
• Chemical weathering:  Developing quantitative reactive transport models for rock weathering
• Reactive transport modeling: Approaches to numerical modeling of reactive contaminant transport and water-rock interaction
• Mineral-water kinetics: Mineral dissolution and precipitation kinetics      
• Biogeochemistry: Biogeochemical reactions in groundwater and estuaries
• Hydrothermal systems:  Mineral-water reactions and transport in mid-ocean ridge and off-axis hydrothermal systems

Selected Publications

Maher, K., C.I. Steefel, D. DePaolo, B. Viani, 2006, The mineral dissolution rate conundrum:  Insights from reactive transport modeling of U isotopes and pore fluid chemistry in marine sediments.  Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta 70: 337-363.

Steefel, C.I, D. DePaolo, and P.C. Lichtner, 2005, Reactive transport modeling:  An essential tool and a new research approach for the Earth sciences, Earth and Planetary Science Letters 240: 539-558.

Steefel, C.I., 2004, Evaluation of the field-scale cation exchange capacity of Hanford sediments.  Proceedings of the 11^th International Symposium on Water-Rock Interaction, R.B. Wanty and R.R. Seal (eds.), Taylor and Francis Group, London, 999-1002.

Steefel, C.I., Carroll, S., Zhao, P., and Roberts, S., 2003, Cesium migration in Hanford sediment:  A multi-site cation exchange model based on laboratory transport experiments.  J. of Contaminant Hydrology 67, 219-246.

Giambalvo, E.R., Steefel, C.I., Fisher, A.T., Rosenberg, N.D., and Wheat, C.G., 2002, Effect of fluid-sediment reaction on hydrothermal fluxes of major elements, eastern flank of the Juan de Fuca Ridge.  Geochimica et. Cosmochimica Acta 66, 1739-1757.

Steefel, C.I., 2000, New directions in hydrogeochemical transport modeling:  Incorporating multiple kinetic and equiibrium reaction pathways.  (L.R. Bentley, J.F. Sykes, C.A. Brebbia, W.G. Gray & G.F. Pinder, eds.) Computational Methods in Water Resources XIII, A.A. Balkema, Rotterdam, 331-338.

Steefel, C.I. and Lichtner, P.C., 1998, Multicomponent reactive transport in discrete fractures:  I. Controls on reaction front geometry. J. Hydrology 209, 186-199.

Steefel, C.I. and Lichtner, P.C., 1998, Multicomponent reactive transport in discrete fractures:  II. Infiltration of hyperalkaline groundwater at Maqarin, Jordan, a natural analogue site. J. Hydrology 209, 200-224.

Steefel, C.I. and MacQuarrie, K.T.B., 1996, Approaches to modeling reactive transport in porous media.  In Reactive Transport in Porous Media (P.C. Lichtner, C.I. Steefel, and E.H. Oelkers, eds.), Reviews in Mineralogy 34, 83-125.

Steefel, C.I., and Lasaga, A.C., 1994, A coupled model for transport of multiple  chemical species and kinetic precipitation/dissolution reactions with application to reactive flow in single phase hydrothermal systems. American Journal of Science  294, 529-592.

Steefel, C.I., and Lichtner, P.C., 1994, Diffusion and reaction in rock matrix bordering a hyperalkaline fluid-filled fracture.   Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta  58, 3592-3612.

Steefel, C.I. and Lasaga, A.C., 1992, Putting transport into water-rock interaction models. Geology,  20, 680-684.

Steefel, C.I. and Van Cappellen, P., 1990, A new kinetic approach to modeling water-rock interaction:  The role of nucleation, precursors, and Ostwald ripening.  Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta, 54, 2657-2677.

Carl Steefel
Staff Scientist

Geochemistry Department

Phone: 510-486-7311
Fax: 510-486-5686
Email: CISteefel@lbl.gov