• Proceedings of the Korean Geotechical Society Conference
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• 2001.03a
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• pp.405-410
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• 2001

Bioremediation is a degradation process of existing organic contaminants in soils and groundwater by indigenous or inoculated microorganisms. This process can provide economical solution as well as safe and effective alternative in remediation technologies. However, it has been suggested that the rate of bioremediation process of organic contaminants by microorganisms can be limited by the concentration of nutrients and TEAs(Terminal Electron Accepters). In in-situ bioremediation, conventional pumping techniques have been used for supplying these additives. However, the injection of these additives is difficult in low permeable soils, and also hindered by preferential flow paths resulting from heterogeneities in high permeable ground. Therefore, the Injection of chemical additives is the most significant concern in in-situ bioremediation. Most recently, electrokinetic technique has been applied into the bioremediation and the injection characteristics under electrokinetics have not been examined in various soil types. Therefore, in this study, electrokinetic injection method is investigated in kaolinite and sand, and the concentration of ammonium(nutrients) and sulfate(TEAs) in soil is presented.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Soil and Groundwater Environment Conference
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• 2003.04a
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• pp.306-309
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• 2003

Surfactant-enhanced electrokinetic (EK) remediation is an emerging technology that can effectively remove hydrocarbons from low-permeability soils. In this study, the electrokinetic remediation using Calfax 16L-35 was conducted for the removal of phenanthrene from kaolinite. An anionic surfactant Calfax 16L-35 was used at concentrations of 5, 15, and 30g/L to enhance the solubility of phenanthrene. When the surfactant solution was applied to EK system, low electrical potential gradient was maintained because of its ions. Even when the surfactant concentration was high, the removal efficiency of phenanthrene was low After the operation, most of surfactants were remained in soil and there were few in effluent. This phenomena was observed because the migration of Calfax 16L-35 from cathode to anode was predominant over electroosmotic flow which moved in opposite direction. Therefore, the anionic surfactant Calfax 16L-35 is considered to be improper in surfactant - enhanced electrokinetic remediation.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Visualization
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.45-50
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• 2005

Electro-osmotic flow (EOF) instability in a microchannel has been experimentally investigated using a micro-PIV system. The micro-PIV system consisting of a two-head Nd:Yag laser and cooled CCD camera was used to measure instantaneous velocity fields and vorticity contours of the EOF instability in a T-shape glass microchannel. The electrokinetic flow instability occurs in the presence of electric conductivity gradients. Charge accumulation at the interface of conductivity gradients leads to electric body forces, driving the coupled flow and electric field into an unstable dynamics. The threshold electric field above which the flow becomes unstable and rapid mixing occurs is about 1000V/cm. As the electric field increases, the flow pattern becomes unstable and vortical motion is enhanced. This kind of instability is a key factor limiting the robust performance of complex electrokinetic bio-analytical devices, but can also be used for rapid mixing and effective flow control fer micro-scale bio-chips.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Soil and Groundwater Environment Conference
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• 2003.09a
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• pp.330-333
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• 2003

Recently electrokinetic process is known to be a promising remediation technology for the contaminated soils with heavy metals, radionuclides, organic matters, and so on. The contaminants in electrokinetic technology are removed mainly by three mechanisms; electroosmosis, electromigration, and electrophoresis. When direct current is introduced between two electrodes planted in soil, a large amount of hydrogen ions is formed and moves from anode to cathode with the other cations contained in electrolyte. The water flow caused by tile movement of cations is called as electroosmosis. Especially for non-ionic pollutants, the electroosmotic flow(EOF) is the most important removal mechanism among them and transports contaminants from anode to cathode along the water flow. In this study, characteristics of electroosmotic flow was investigated according to the resistance state of soil. The decrease, maintenance, and increase of soil resistance could be obtained by controlling ions in soil. When the resistance of soil was decreasing or maintained, the EOF is proportional to electric current and voltage, respectively and when the resistance was increasing, the EOF is proportional to only electric current not voltage.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.83-91
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• 2003

The electrokinetic technique has been applied to remove mainly the heavy metal and the ultrasonic technique to remove mainly organic substance in contaminated soil. In this study, the combined electrokinetic and ultrasonic remediation technique was studied far the removal of heavy metal and organic substance in contaminated soils. This study emphasized the coupled effects of electrokinetic and ultrasonic techniques on migration as well as remediation of contaminants in soils. The laboratory soil flushing tests combining electrokinetic and ultrasonic technique were conducted using specially designed and fabricated devices to determine the effect of both of these techniques. A series of laboratory experiments involving the simple, electrokinetic, ultrasonic, and electrokinetic & ultrasonic flushing test were carried out. A soil admixed with sand and kaolin was used as a test specimen, and Pb and ethylene glycol were used as contaminants of heavy metal and organic substance. An increase in out flow, permeability and contaminant removal rate was observed in electrokinetic and ultrasonic flushing tests. Some practical implications of these results are discussed in terms of technical feasibility of in situ implementation of electrokinetic ultrasonic remediation technique.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.61-68
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• 2004

Three kinds of toxic heavy metals, such as lead, copper, and cadmium, existing abundantly in contaminated soils were selected to investigate pH change, electroosmotic flow, and the removal rate in the application of electrokinetic process. In the change of pHs, they reached to about 12 and 2 at each cathodic and anodic region, respectively, and maintained for reaction being proceeded. Electroosmotic flow rates were not influenced by the kind of metal species but by electropotential gradient. On the soils contaminated by each metal, the removal rate of Cd was the fastest among three as in the order of Cd>Pb>Cu. While on the soils contaminated by mixed metal species, Cu was the fastest. Metal species transported by electrokinetic processes were distributed in between 0.9 and 1.0 of normalized region. In the case of soils contaminated by one kind of metal. the relative concentrations of Pb and Cd estimated in between normalized region 0.9 and 1.0 were 5.2 and 5.7, respectively.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Soil and Groundwater Environment Conference
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• 2003.09a
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• pp.356-359
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• 2003

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are representative hydrophobic organic carbons (HOCs). Surfactant-enhanced electrokinetic (EK) remediation is an innovative in-situ technology that can effectively remove HOCs from low-permeability soils. In this study, the electrokinetic remediation using Tergitol 15-S-12, a nonionic surfactant, was conducted for the removal of phenanthrene from kaolinite. Tergitol 15-S-12 was used at concentrations of 1.5, 2.0, 2.5 and 7.5 g/L to enhance the solubility of phenanthrene. When the surfactant solution was applied to EK system, high electrical potential gradient was maintained and the amount of electroosmotic flow decreased. Removal efficiency of phenanthrene was proportional to the concentration of Tergitol 15-S-12 because the solubility and mobility of phenanthrene was enhanced by surfactant micelle. Therefore, the suitable concentration of nonionic surfactant Tergitol 15-S-12 is expected to improve the removal efficiency of PAHs in EK remediation.

• Geotechnical Engineering
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• v.13 no.6
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• pp.123-138
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• 1997

Electroosmotic tests were performed on saturated marine clay specimens contaminated with lead to investigate the efficiency of the electrokinetic technique for removal of heavy metals from the cohesive soils. For this purpose, testing program included variable conditions such as the concentration of lead (500, 5, 000, 50, 000mg/kg), the level of electrical current (10, 50, 100 mA), operating duration (5, 15, 30days), and the application of three dirtferent chemicals for enhancement in efficiency. The pH of inflow and outflow, electroosmotic flow and electrical conductivity during the test, and the pH and the concentration of lead across the specimen after the test are presented. Test results came to the conclusion that the electrokinetic technique was very effective to remove heavy metals such as lead from the contaminated cohesive soil. Adding ecetic acid at the cathod to dissolve the procipitates of lead hydroxide as found to be effective for the enhancement of the efficiency in remediation.

• Journal of Soil and Groundwater Environment
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.6-15
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• 2013

The influence of processing fluids and electrode spacing on the electrokinetic process was evaluated to remediate As-, Cu-, Pb-contaminated soil. Single and mixture of sodium citrate, EDTA and NaOH was used to investigate the metal extraction. EDTA for washing reagent showed the highest removal efficiency. Based on the extraction result, the electrode spacing (20, 40, 60 cm) on the electrokinetic process was investigated to remove the multi-metals from soil. The highest removal was observed at the experiment with 60 cm of electrode spacing, however, the correlation between electrode spacing and removal of metals was not clear. The electrode spacing influenced the amount of accumulated electro-osmotic flow. BCR sequential extraction showed that electrokinetic process removed the fractionation of metals bound to Fe-Mn oxyhydroxide.

• Proceedings of the IEEK Conference
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• 2001.10a
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• pp.91-96
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• 2001

Restoration of contaminated soils to an environmentally acceptable condition is important. One of the newer techniques in soil remediation is a method based on electrokinetic phenomena in soils. The technology uses electricity to affect chemical concentrations and water flow through the pores of soils. An important advantage of electrokinetic soil remediation over other in-situ processes such as soil flushing is the capability of control over the movement of the contaminants. Because the migration of the contaminants is confined by the electric field, there is little dispersion outside the treatment zone. Furthermore, the process is effective for soils with low and variable permeability. In the present study, the distributions of cadmium in the electrokinetic processing of kaolinite under the condition of constant applied voltage are investigated. Cadmium accumulates near the cathode without reducing the diffusion of hydroxide ion into the soil. In keeping the catholyte pH at neutrality, cadmium migrates toward the cathode without any accumulation of cadmium near the cathode and is successfully removed at the cathode reservoir. It was also found that the progress of electrokinetic processing of cadmium could be gasped to a certain extent by monitoring the local voltage and the current density.