Chemical Oxidation of Chlorinated Solvents in Contaminated Groundwater: Review

Abstract

The groundwater contaminated with chlorinated solvents poses daunting challenges for environmental remediation. Conventional treatment technologies such as pump-and-treat and bioremediation are costly and may require lengthy treatment periods. In situ chemical oxidation can be cost competitive with conventional treatment technologies and can destroy the contaminants rather than transferring them to another media. Four oxidants including hydrogen peroxide (Fenton’s reagent and Fenton-like), permanganate, persulfate, and ozone commonly employed in the chemical oxidation process are evaluated in this paper. The applicability of various oxidizing agents in subsurface contaminant remediation is also reviewed. Chemical oxidation technologies are effective and inexpensive alternatives. The merits also include that oxidation is relatively unaffected by contaminant characteristics and concentration. Future development-related chemical oxidation technology including a treatment train system, application of zero-valent iron nanoparticles in chemical oxidation processes, and solubilizer enhanced chemical oxidation are depicted. The summaries of this review paper regarding the chemical oxidation are applicable for designing in situ chemical oxidation systems.