Major factors affecting in situ biodegradation rates of jet-fuel during large-scale biosparging project in sedimentary bedrock

Abstract

Biodegradation of petroleum hydrocarbons (TPH), mainly jet fuel, had taken place at the former Soviet Army air base in the Czech Republic. The remediation of large-scale petroleum contamination of soil and groundwater has provided valuable information about biosparging efficiency in the sandstone sedimentary bedrock. In 1997 petroleum contamination was found to be present in soil and groundwater across an area of 28 hectares, divided for the clean-up purpose into smaller clean-up fields (several hectares). The total estimated quantity of TPH released to the environment was about 7,000 metric tons. Biosparging was applied as an innovative clean-up technology at the site and was operated over a 10-year period (1997–2008). Importance of a variety of factors that affect bacterial activity in unsaturated and saturated zones was widely studied on the site and influence of natural and technological factors on clean-up efficiency in heavily contaminates areas of clean-up fields (initial contaminant mass 111–452 metric ton/ha) was evaluated. Long-term monitoring of the groundwater temperature has shown seasonal rises and falls of temperature which have caused a fluctuation in biodegradation activity during clean-up. By contrast, an overall rise of average groundwater temperature was observed in the clean-up fields, most probably as a result of the biological activity during the clean-up process. The significant rise of biodegradation rates, observed after air sparging intensification, and strong linear correlation between the air injection rates and biodegradation activities have shown that the air injection rate is the principal factor in biodegradation efficiency in heavily contaminated areas. It has a far more important role for achieving a biodegradation activity than the contamination content which appeared to have had only a slight effect after the removal of about 75% of initial contamination.

Keywords:

• Petroleum hydrocarbons
• air sparging
• bioremediation
• sandstone

Acknowledgments

The clean-up project was financed from the Czech state budget under control of the Czech Ministry of Environment. Scientific research was performed within the EU Seventh Framework Programme, Priority 6, BACSIN No. 211684. Authors would like to thank the clean-up project managers Stanislava Proksova and Ferdinand Hercik for participation in soil data evaluation and soil sampling methods development and to the project team performing field measurements and soil sampling. Further we thank to William DiGiuseppi, who is employed in AECOM USA, for reviewing and commenting on the paper.