Adapting, optimizing, and evaluating a model for the remediation of LNAPL in heterogeneous soil environments

Abstract

This research identifies the well components, operation factors, and the soil and hydrogeological parameters that influence the recovery of Light-Non-Aqueous-Phase-Liquids (LNAPL) in an heterogeneous environment using pumping wells. The purpose of this research is to improve the analysis of sites contaminated by LNAPLs to efficiently recover the feasible amounts of LNAPL in the sites. The focus is on heterogeneous soil environments. The model adapted to analyze the recovery of LNAPL from the contaminated sites was improved to account for a high degree of vertical heterogeneity, including the vertical variation of one or several of the soil properties within the same layer. This research also studies the optimization of the recovery of LNAPL for the system of wells both at the level of one well and a system of wells. The developed model and method are applied to a real site. Thus, the model’s ability to estimate the performance of a system of recovery wells is evaluated using real soil data and performance measurements. This research constitutes a robust background regarding the design, operation, analysis, and optimization of a system of recovery wells in a heterogeneous soil environment.