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Home My WebLink AboutNCD980602163_19911207_Warren County PCB Landfill_SERB C_EPA Tech Trends-OCR,. &EPA U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Office of Solid Waste and Emergency Response Technology Innovation Office EPA/540/M-911005 No. 7 December 1991 •11~~~~- ;:S;;; - -::::=-:::=== =-I iiii Ii i1 ii The applied technologies journal for Superfund removals and remedial actions and RCRA corrective actions :'.:>:: :::/::/:< ;::::-:: : . </·. . •::<?>><<:\:}\.{{:>>>:::::::::: {:\)\\/ ·tou . wil I n:tice :h:t t~:!:~:i;:;~>· I of Tech Trends contains an .. insert on "Innovations In · > .· .. i. l'v1onltoring .and Measurement .·••·>< y()u in emergency response / / remediation and corrective > ·. / \ . f lit~:1/i:~t,illij~:1:1,11 . njgqe[/a fie.l~-po[t.apl§ < rripnitoring $ysternthaf lirjk9 Up .J9fin9!1site comput~fli~W <•• . iltl1f !;~~;i~g~~~!lllil\li . > Al§O, dpn't missJhij] . <q~@riptionof theQt~469R ,1 :1( f l~ii~~if lii~li)ll11:11 · .... ·. ·ji~~h·~pc~;1J~::v~hi~••i0••Rj~··•f01······················ irif6frifatio~/aboutinri6Vatiy~ t< l .···.i~cho9IOQieS, consuffihg"vvith.·••J••< •·•·••····••j~~i\~f ~;eda~~ 1 W]s~•~i••········••··•····•····•··•·•••i•···••••••••··•••••••••••••••• -~~ Printed on Recycled Paper PCBs Destroyed by Combining Thermal & Chemical Treatments by Paul de Percin, Risk Reduction Engineering Laboratory Aaerobic thermal processor (ATP) technology involves a physical separation process that thermally desorbs organics such as polychlorinated oiphenyls (PCBs) from soil and sludge. The ATP process is being used in conjunction with I jj I PCBs Anaerobic thermal processor ~ ~ Soil and sludge dehalogenation to chemic:ally destroy PCBs in the soil at the Wide Beach Development Site in Brant, New York. The technology can also be applied to many other types of or- ganic contaminants. ATP was developed by Alberta Oil Sands Technology and Research Authority and is licensed by SoilTech, Inc. At Wide Beach, the transportable ATP unit processes about 10 tons of contaminated soil per hour. The ATP system heats and mixes contaminated soils, sludges and liquids in a unit that uses indirect heat for processing. The processor contains four separate internal thermal zones: the preheat, retort, combustion and cooling zones. For this demonstration, the contaminated soils are sprayed with a diesel fuel and oil mixture containing alkaline polyethylene glycol (APEG) reagents before entering the preheat zone. The oil mixture acts as a carrier for the dehalogenation reagents . In the preheat zone, water and volatile organic compounds (VOC) vaporize. At the same time, the reagents dehalogenate or chemically break down chlorinated compounds (including PCBs). The vaporized contaminants and water are removed via a vacuum to a (see PCB page 2) Innovative Treatments Selected for Superfund Sites Contaminated by PCBs (/) C 0 'vi ·u Q) 0 0 0 a: 0 <ii ..0 E :::, z 5 I I 4~ I 3~ I Dechlorination In Situ Solvent Thermal Bloremedlation In Situ Flushing Extraction Desorption Vitrification 1 2 • Flame Reactor for Heavy Metals by Marta Richards, Risk Reduction Engineering Laboratory Ttie Horsehead Resource Development (HRD) Company, Inc., F1ame Reactor is a patented and proven high temperature thermal process that safely treats industrial residues and wastes containing met- als. As a Superfund Innovative Technology Evalua- tion (SITE) Demonstration, approximately 72 tons of waste material containing heavy metals from the Na- tional Smelting and Refining site in Atlanta, Georgia, / I ii I Metals /'"'wl Flame Reactor ,(",.....,,_,; Indu strial ~= residues were successfully treated with the HRD F1ame Reactor. The waste material was a granular secondary lead smelter blast furnace soda slag containing approximately 15.0% carbon, 10.3% iron, 12.2% sodium, 5.3% sulfur, 5.--+% lead, 5% silicon, 2.5% chlorine, 0.4% zinc, 0.05% arsenic, 0.04% cadmium and approximately 15.0% water. For this SITE demonstration the material was dried and passed through a hammem1ill prior to treatment. This demonstration testing was run with naturnl gas. At high temperatures inside the HRD Flame Reactor, the volatile metals in the waste were volatilized and the organic compounds were destroyed, leaving a non-teachable slag containing the non-volatile metals and gases, including steam and volatile metal vapors. The metal vapors further reacted and cooled in the combustion chamber and cooling system to produce a metal-enriched oxide that was collected in a baghouse. The resulting metal oxides can be recycled to re- cover the metals. Results from the demonstration are quite good. Although samples of raw feed failed the Toxicity Characteristic Leaching Procedure (TCLP) test due to high cadmium and lead levels, all samples of pro- cessed waste slag passed the TCLP test for all metals. The processed waste slag can be used as fill material. Lead and zinc were concentrated i:1 the baghouse dust, which potentially could be recycled for its lead content. The process showed better than 90 percent recovery for both lead and zinc. The lead and zinc concentrations in the waste feed, the baghouse dust and th e separator slag are shown below. Total Metal Lead Zinc Waste Feed (% weight) 5.4 0.4 Slag (% weight) 0.6 0.2 Baghouse (% weight) 17.4 l'.4 Overall, the weight of the waste was reduced by approximately 30%, largely due to removal of water and carbon during pretreatment and treatment. SO2 emissions were high due to the amount of sulfur in the waste, but the SO2 emis- sions could readily be controlled with the use of a scrubber. The HRD F1ame Reactor technology can potentially be applied to many types of granular solids, soil, flue dust, slag and sludge containing high concen- trations of heavy metals and hazardous organics. An Applications Analysis Report and a 1:echn~logy Ev~uatio~ Report ~e- scribing the complete HRD SITE Demonstrat:Ion -:v111 be avrulabl~ m the Spi:-ng of 1992. For more information now, call Marta Richards at the Risk Reduct.10n Engineering Laboratory on FTS 684-7783 or 513-569-7733 . PCB (from page 1) preheat vapor cooling system consisting of a cy- clone, condenser and a three-phase preheat separa- tor. The noncondensed light organic vapors are then fed by a blower directly into the combustion chamber of the process or. The oil frac tion is re- cycled to a reagent blending tank, and recovered water is sent to the onsite treatment system. From the preheat zone, the hOl, granular sol- ids pass through a sand seal to the rerort zone. Here, heavy oils vaporize and L'lermal cracking of hydrocarbons forms coke and low rr.olecular weight gases. The vapor strea:1 fro:n the retort zone is removed via a vacuwn and passes first through a two-stage pair of cyc lones to remove en- trained particles. These dusts and fir.es are blended with the treated soil. The vapor is '.I:en cooled by oil circulating in two packed colum:,s, acting as a rwo-stage direct contact conde:,ser :-o , the higher boiling point compounds. Tl::: JJJCO:'.drnsed va- pors are lhcn cooled in a wate,-co .. -:,:c: noncontact condemer and pass througb e :.:1:ee<::::se separa- tor. The final noncondensab!e gases ::.;·e returned to the combustion chamber. 'Leo:: ph ase is com- bined with the condensate fror.: the !acked col- umns. This oil condensate is c.':en st:H to the re- agent blending unit to mix wi:.:0 the APEG re- agents. The blend is pumped at a !T:easured rate and is applied to the untreated soils ;0. the feed chute of the processor. Conde:,sed 11•ater is pumped directly io the onsite ::eatmem system. The coked soils pass tb.ro·Jgh a second sand seal into the combustion zone. Here the coked soils are combusted and either recycled to the re- tort zone or sent to be cooled in the cooling zone. Flue gas from the combustion zone is treated in a system consisting of a cyclone and baghouse that removes particulates, a scrubber that removes acid gases and a carbon adsorption bed that removes trace orgfil1ics. The treated flue gas is then dis - charged to the atmosphere Lhrough 2. stack. Treated soils exiting the cooling zone are quenched wi th scrubber water and are then trwsponed by conveyor to an outside storage pile. The ATP unit removed over 99% of the PCBs in the contaminated soil (orig inal concentra- tions of 50 to 100 parts per million), resulting in PCB levels below the desired cleanup concentra- tion of 2 ppm. The ATP does not appear to create dioxins or furans. Additionally, no \'Olatile or semivolatile organic degradation products or leachates were detected in the treated soil. For more information, call Pau2 de Percin at the Risk Reduction Engineering Lat-oratory on FTS 684-7797 or 51 3-569-7797.