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Search Result from the July 2006 Issue

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TECHNICAL AND ECONOMIC FEASIBILITY OF SOIL FLUSHING WITH NON-IONIC SURFACTANT TO REMEDIATE GAS WELL CONDENSATE
Felske, Daniela and Paul R. Morton, EBA Engineering Consultants Ltd. RemTech 2005: Remediation Technologies Symposium, 19-21 October 2005, Banff, Alberta, Canada. Book of Abstracts, p 81, 2005

A feasibility study was conducted at the pilot scale to assess the technical and economic viability of cleansing condensate-contaminated soils surrounding a main gas-gathering pipeline in northern Alberta by in situ soil flushing with non-ionic surfactant. A commercially available non-ionic surfactant (Ivey-sol) was evaluated for its solubility-increasing properties as an economic means of solubilizing soil-bonded condensate inaccessible to ex situ remediation. An injection/recovery well configuration located within the condensate spill pathway was used for a series of interwell tests that involved surfactant injection and its recovery from a nearby pumped recovery well. Sodium bromide was used as a conservative tracer to assist with the selection of surfactant and solubilized hydrocarbon samples from the recovery well for laboratory analysis. Surfactant, hydrocarbon, and tracer breakthrough curves were plotted for the recovered ground water and provided sufficient information from which to quantify the surfactant effects on recovered ground water. The findings demonstrated that over the projected time for the attainment of soil and ground-water remediation objectives, the non-ionic surfactant achieved significant solubilization and soil remediation of condensate at economical rates compared to bioventing, biosparging, or soil vapor extraction.



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