Surfactant dissolution and mobilization of LNAPL contaminants in aquifers

Improper disposal, accidental spills and leaks of non-aqueous phase liquids (NAPL) such as gasoline, fuel oil and creosote result in long-term persistent sources of groundwater pollution. Column and 2-D tanks experiments were conducted to evaluate the use of surfactant-enhanced recovery of light non-aqueous phase liquids (LNAPL) in groundwater aquifers. These experiments focused on the use of surfactants to promote dissolution and mobilization in addition to evaluating the increase of aqueous phase permeability as residual NAPL is recovered. Further experiments are presented that show the innovative use of surfactants during primary pumping to recover free product can potentially increase the amount of free product recovered, can potentially reduce the amount of residual NAPL remaining after primary pumping and performs better than the use of surfactants to mobilize trapped residual NAPL.