Centrifuge modeling of air-sparging technique for groundwater remediation

Air sparging is one of the groundwater remediation techniques to clean up voltaic organic compounds. Based on the centrifuge tests employing glass beads as model soil, the process of air sparging is simulated under a wide range of sparging pressure and centrifuge g levels. The test results show that the increase of the sparging pressure improves the air flow velocity. There exists a critical sparging pressure, while the zone of influence (ZOI) expands with the increase of sparging pressure when it is lower than the critical value, and the ZOI decreases a little and then keeps constant when it is higher than the critical value. The ZOI decreases with the increase of soil particle size and g-level. The ZOI is cone-shaped and can be described by use of the virtual sparging point and cone angle. The test results provide valuable information for the design of air sparging system for groundwater remediation.