Radio frequency heating for soil remediation
- KAI Technologies, Inc., Portsmouth, NH (United States)
- Envirogen, Inc., Canton, MA (United States)
Radio frequency heating (RFH) for soil remediation brings controlled heating to the subsurface, increasing the rate of removal of contaminants from the soil. RFH alone does not remove contaminants; it eases contaminant removal by enhancing the performance of other technologies such as Soil Vapor Extraction (SVE), Groundwater Venting (Air Sparging), Groundwater Pump and Treat, and Bioremediation. In general, heating soils and groundwater makes the physical, chemical and biological properties of the soil, groundwater and contaminants more amenable to remediation efforts, reducing time on-site. RFH technology for environmental remediation by KAI Technologies Inc. (KAI) began in the early 1990s when an RFH system was deployed to an East Coast Naval Shipyard and tested on a {number_sign}2 fuel oil spill. RFH was then employed by KAI at the Department of Energy`s Savannah River Site (SRS) in 1993 and at Kelly Air Force Base in 1994. This paper discusses the spring 1996 RFH demonstration conducted with DAHL and Associates of St. Paul, Minnesota which employed SVE and Groundwater Venting at the site of a former gasoline station near St. Paul, Minnesota. Currently, RFH is assisting SVE at a jet fuel spill within Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico. This paper provides a general overview of RFH technology for soil remediation by reviewing the theory and computer modeling of RFH and presenting results on the efficacy of RFH with SVE for soil remediation from a bench-scale study and the field demonstration mentioned previously. The bench-scale study evaluated effectiveness of RFH for enhancing SVE removal of tetrachloroethylene from a Burlington, Massachusetts site. Data from Finite-Difference Time Domain (FDTD) computer modeling of the field demonstration provides insight into the shape of the subsurface heating pattern.
- OSTI ID:
- 353667
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-970677-; TRN: IM9929%%213
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 90. annual meeting and exhibition of the Air and Waste Management Association, Toronto (Canada), 8-13 Jun 1997; Other Information: PBD: 1997; Related Information: Is Part Of 1997 proceedings of the Air and Waste Management Association`s 90. annual meeting and exhibition; PB: [7000] p.
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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