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In this paper, four treatment techniques commonly applied to Volatile Organic Compounds (VOC) removal from soil are compared in column experiments with pure sand containing a residual Light Non-Aqueous Phase Liquid (L-NAPL) contamination. Oxidation is tested through the injection of Fenton reagent, with persulfate, and combined with sparging with the injection of ozone. Surfactant treatment was conducted at low flow rates with Tween ® 80. Sparging was conducted by air injection but at a low flow rate of 1 mL min −1 . Finally several columns were thermally treated at a temperature of 80 °C. The results showed high removal (>90%) for all techniques used, although only thermal treatment on BTEX (Benzene, Toluene, Ethylbenzene and Xylenes) reached 100% efficiency. The main limiting factors of each technique were: (i) for oxidation, the solubility of the substance limited the removal; (ii) for surfactant both the solubility in the surfactant and the type of surfactant are important; (iii) for sparging, the main factors are contaminant vapor pressure and porous media grain size; (iv) for thermal treatment, the limitation arises from the contaminant vapor pressure and the medium hydraulic conductivity. A comparison with literature data shows that the results are consistent with most of the studies conducted on one technique. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The aim of this work was to extend and to validate the flux tube-mixed instantaneous and kinetics superposition sequence approach (FT-MIKSS) to reaction chains of degrading species. Existing analytical solutions for the reactive transport of chains of decaying solutes were embedded in the flux-tube approach in order to conceive a semi-analytical model that allows fast parameter fitting. The model was applied for chloroethenes undergoing reductive dechlorination and oxidation in homogeneous and heterogeneous aquifers with sorption. The results from the semi-analytical model were compared to results from three numerical models (RT3D, PH3TD, PHAST). All models were validated in a homogeneous domain with an existing analytical solution. In heterogeneous domains, we found significant differences between the four models. FT-MIKSS gave intermediate results for all modelled cases. Results were obtained almost instantaneously, whereas other models had calculation times of up to several hours. Chloroethene plumes and redox conditions at the Plattsburgh field site were realistically modelled by FT-MIKSS, although results differed somewhat from those of PHT3D and PHAST. It is concluded that it may be tedious to obtain correct modelling results in heterogeneous media with degradation chain reactions and that the comparison of two different models may be useful. FT-MIKSS is a valuable tool for fast parameter fitting at field sites and should be used in the preparation of longer model runs with other numerical models. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Various numerical reactive transport models were developed in the last decade to simulate plumes of pollutants in heterogeneous aquifers. However, these models remain difficult to use for the non-specialist, and the computation times are often long. Users who need to fit several model parameters to match predictions with field data in heterogeneous aquifers may be discouraged by the time needed to run the simulations. The objective of this paper is to provide a set of approximations that allow performing almost instantaneous calculations for transport of redox-reactive pollutants, the most common examples being benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylenes (BTEX). The approach relies on two major tools: (i) the use of flux tubes (FT), a variant of stream tubes that include dispersion, and (ii) sequential superposition of the reactions (Mixed Instantaneous and Kinetics Superposition Sequence (MIKSS)). The calculation of transport is uncoupled from the calculation of reactions. The superposition principle has been used previously for the analytical solution of a bimolecular reaction of an electron donor with an acceptor and is here extended to more than one dissolved electron acceptor reacting with more than one donor. The approach is furthermore improved by including limitations of the kinetic reactions according to the availability of the reactants and by combining kinetic and instantaneous reactions. The results computed with this approach are compared to three well known numerical models (RT3D, PHT3D, PHAST) for various test cases including uniform, slightly diverted or highly irregular flow fields and several reaction schemes for BTEX. The FT-MIKSS solution gives nearly the same results as the other models and proved to be very flexible. The major advantage of the FT-MIKSS solution is fast computation times that are generally 100 to 1000 times faster than other numerical models. This approach might be a useful tool during the long fitting procedure of field data, which may be followed by one single run of a classical numerical model using the best-fit parameters. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]