A Remediation Study of Soils Contaminated by Chlorinated Hydrocarbons with Mechanical Soil Aeration

Abstract

Mechanical soil aeration is an effective and low cost ex-situ remediation technique suitable for large areas of volatile organic contaminated sites. To understand the effectiveness of the remediation technique, the current study remediated an abandoned industry site for a typical chlor-alkali chemical using this technology. The results showed that the technology is effective in the remediation of volatile organic compounds with a pass percentage greater than 90%. The results also showed that a lower vapor pressure or higher molecular weight with the similar concentration of pollution resulted in higher residual concentrations, which need increasing agitation frequency or machine power to promote the volatilization of pollutants. In addition, we found that the more pollution or water or organic matters (more than 1%) contained, the higher concentration of residual. These type of soils should be remediated not only by physical agitations but also by other strengthen measures and long period. The present study aims to promote the remediation of contaminated sites, especially large areas contaminated by volatile contaminants.