Using Waste Foundry Sands as Reactive Media in Permeable Reactive Barriers

Permeable reactive barriers (PRBs) are in-situ barriers constructed in a subsurface to treat contaminated groundwater using various reactive media. The common reactive medium used in PRB is zero-valent iron, which has been widely used to treat chlorinated solvents (i.e., PCE, TCE). A disadvantage of iron media is high cost. In this study, waste foundry sands were tested to determine the feasibility of their use as a low cost reactive medium. Batch and column tests were conducted with TCE to determine transport parameters and reactivity of the foundry sands. The reactivities of foundry sands for common groundwater contaminants are comparable to or slightly higher than those for Peerless iron, a common medium used in PRBs. In addition, the TOC and clay in foundry sands can significantly retard the movement of target contaminant, which may result in lower effluent concentration of contaminant due to biodegradation. In general, PRBs 1-m thick can be constructed with many foundry sands to treat TCE provided the zero-valent iron content in the foundry sand is higher than 1%.