Removal of mercury from contaminated groundwater to part per trillion levels
- ADA Technologies, Inc., Englewood, CO (United States)
ADA has developed a process for removing mercury from contaminated groundwater and has demonstrated a pilot-scale version of this process at a DOE site. The technology will treat the mercury-contaminated groundwater, primary liquid wastes in DOE`s inventory and the mercury-contaminated secondary liquid wastes that will result from many of the processes and activities planned for treating the mercury-contaminated solids, soils, debris, and aqueous wastes in DOE`s inventory. This process is also applicable to cleanup of mercury contaminated sites not found in DOE. ADA`s process is based on the highly efficient and selective sorption of mercury by noble metals. Contaminated liquid flows through a packed bed that contains microporous sorbent particles on which a noble metal has been finely dispersed. When the sorbent is loaded with mercury to the point of breakthrough, the flow of contaminated liquid is switched to a fresh sorbent bed. The spent bed is regenerated by heating, first to drive off residual water and then to drive off the mercury. A small flow of purge gas carries the desorbed mercury to a condenser where the mercury is recovered. Current column tests at the Y-12 weapons plant are showing a removal of mercury from 800 ng/l to less than 1 ng/liter using two columns in series. In bench-scale tests using mercuric chloride from 0.5 mg/l to 50 mg/l Hg, ADA has demonstrated the key components that are needed for a practical, regenerable sorption process for removing and recovering dissolved mercury from liquid streams: (1) sorbents have been found that have a high capacity for elemental as well as dissolved, ionic mercury, (2) ionic mercury is removed at greater than 99% efficiency, and (3) the spent sorbent is thermally regenerable.
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
- DOE Contract Number:
- AC21-97MC32195
- OSTI ID:
- 679455
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-980632-; TRN: IM9940%%274
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 91. annual meeting and exhibition of the Air and Waste Management Association, San Diego, CA (United States), 14-18 Jun 1998; Other Information: PBD: 1998; Related Information: Is Part Of Proceedings of the 91. annual meeting and exhibition. Bridging international boundaries: Clean production for environmental stewardship; PB: [5000] p.
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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