The mass transfer between non-aqueous phase liquid(NAPL) phase and soil gas phase in soil vapor extraction(SVE) process has been investigated by one-dimensional venting experiments. During quasi-steady volatilization of three single-component NAPLs in a sandy soil, constant initial lumped mass transfer coefficient (λgN,0) canbe obtained if the relative saturation (ξ) between NAPL phase and gas phase is higher than a critical value (ξc), andthe lumped mass transfer coefficient decreases with ξ when ξ<ξc. It is also shown that the lumped mass transfercoefficient can be increased by blending porous micro-particles into the sandy soil because of the increasing of theinterfacial area.
Air sparging(AS) is an emerging method to remove VOCs from saturated soils and groundwater. Air sparging performance highly depends on the air distribution resulting in the aquifer. In order to study gas flow characterization, a two-dimensional experimental chamber was designed and installed. In addition, the method by using acetylene as the tracer to directly image the gas distribution results of AS process has been put forward. Experiments were performed with different injected gas flow rates. The gas flow patterns were found to depend significantly on the injected gas flow rate, and the characterization of gas flow distributions in porous media was very different from the acetylene tracing study. Lower and higher gas flow rates generally yield more irregular in shape and less effective gas distributions.
With continuous and slow oxygen-release characteristic, calcium peroxide (CaO2) has been a new source of supplying oxygen for aerobic microbes in bioremediation of contaminated groundwater. Batch experiments were conducted to evaluate the oxygen-release rate of CaO2reacting with water, the regulation of high pH, as well as the growth of mixed aerobic microbes in the medium containing CaO2, The results show that the oxygen-release process of CaO2 comprises three phases. In the first phase, dissolved oxygen levels of water increased sharply, and average oxygen-release rates increased as the adding weight of CaO2 increased, However, the rates almost kept invariable in the latter phases and were approximately 0.48; and 0. 084 mg O2·h^-1, respectively. As the necessary components of medium, potassium dihydrogen phosphate (KH2PO4 ) and amrnoniurn sulphate ((NH4)2SO4) at a certain ratio could regulate pH caused by CaO2 from 12, 1 to the range of 6.5 -8.5, which is helpful for microbial growth, In addition, diauxic growth curve observed in the medium containing CaO2 suggested that the growth of mixed aerobic microbes could be stimulated by the addition of CaO2.