sparging

Air sparging is the process of blowing air directly into the ground water.

Air sparging is less applicable to diesel fuel and kerosene.

The effectiveness of air sparging depends primarily on two factors:

At about $20-50/ton of saturated soil, air sparging is less costly than aboveground treatment systems.

Air sparging should NOT be used if the following site conditions exist:

Air sparging can create groundwater mounding which could potentially cause free product to migrate and contamination to spread.

The steam sparging removes impurities that can impart unwanted flavors and odors to the oil.

Air sparging is the process of injecting air into the ground using a system of blowers and injection wells.

In general, air sparging is more effective for constituents with greater volatility and lower solubility and for soils with higher permeability.

Appropriate use of air sparging may require that it be combined with other remedial methods (e.g., SVE or pump-and-treat).

Air sparging is most often used together with soil vapor extraction (SVE), but it can also be used with other remedial technologies.

Some homebrewers use English sparging, except that the second batch of water is only held long enough for the grain bed to settle, after which recirculation and draining occurs.

Nitrogen sparging creates a significantly higher amount of surface contact between the gas and the product, which in turn creates a much larger opportunity for undesired oxidation to occur.

Air sparging is an in situ remedial technology that reduces concentrations of volatile constituents in petroleum products that are adsorbed to soils and dissolved in groundwater.

Fly sparging (or German sparging), which is used by commercial breweries and many homebrewers, uses continuous process sparging.

English sparging (or batch sparging) drains the wort completely from the mash, after which more water is added, held for a while at 76 C and then drained again.

Air sparging cannot be used to treat groundwater in a confined aquifer because the injected air would be trapped by the saturated confining layer and could not escape to the unsaturated zone.

When used appropriately, air sparging has been found to be effective in reducing concentrations of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) found in petroleum products at underground storage tank (UST) sites.

Air sparging is generally more applicable to the lighter gasoline constituents (i.e., benzene, ethylbenzene, toluene, and xylene [BTEX]), because they readily transfer from the dissolved to the gaseous phase.

Addition of acid and inert-gas sparging allows all bicarbonate and carbonate ions to be converted to carbon dioxide, and this IC product vented along with any POC that was present.

The following description of air sparging is an excerpt from Chapter VII of OUST's publication: How to Evaluate Alternative Cleanup Technologies for Underground Storage Tank Sites: A Guide for Corrective Action Plan Reviewers.

In the aerobic treatment mode, groundwater is oxygenated by one of three methods: Direct sparging of air or oxygen through an injection well; saturation of water with air or oxygen prior to re-injection; or addition of hydrogen peroxide directly into an injection well or into reinjected water.