RESEARCH ARTICLE

Merits and limitations of TiO2-based photocatalytic pretreatment of soils impacted by crude oil for expediting bioremediation

  • Yu Yang 1 ,
  • Hassan Javed 1,2 ,
  • Danning Zhang 1 ,
  • Deyi Li 3 ,
  • Roopa Kamath 4 ,
  • Kevin McVey 4 ,
  • Kanwartej Sra 4 ,
  • Pedro J.J. Alvarez , 1
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  • 1. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Rice University, Houston, TX 77005, USA
  • 2. Department of Chemistry, Rice University, Houston, TX 77005, USA
  • 3. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai 200092, China
  • 4. Chevron Energy Technology Company, Houston, TX 77002, USA

Received date: 22 Jan 2017

Accepted date: 04 Apr 2017

Published date: 23 Aug 2017

Copyright

2017 Higher Education Press and Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

Abstract

Heavy hydrocarbons (HHCs) in soils impacted by crude oil spills are generally recalcitrant to biodegradation due to their low bioavailability and complex chemical structure. In this study, soils were pretreated with varying concentrations of ultraviolet radiation A (UVA) or ultraviolet radiation C (UVC) activated titanium dioxide (TiO2) (1%–5%) under varying moisture conditions (0%–300% water holding capacity (WHC)) to enhance biodegradation of HCCs and shorten remediation timeframes. We demonstrate that pretreatment of impacted soils with UVC-activated TiO2 in soil slurries could enhance bioremediation of HHCs.  Total petroleum hydrocarbon (TPH) removal after 24 h exposure to UVC (254 nm and 4.8 mW/cm2) was (19.1±1.6)% in slurries with 300% WHC and 5 wt-% TiO2. TPH removal was non-selective in the C15-C36 range and increased with moisture content and TiO2 concentration. In a 10-d bioremediation test, TPH removal in treated soil increased to (26.0±0.9)%, compared to (15.4±0.8)% for controls without photocatalytic pre-treatment. Enhanced biodegradation was also confirmed by respirometry. This suggests that addition of UVC-activated TiO2 to soil slurries can transform recalcitrant hydrocarbons into more bioavailable and biodegradable byproducts and increase the rate of subsequent biodegradation. However, similar results were not observed for soils pretreated with UVA activated TiO2. This suggests that activation of TiO2 by sunlight and direct addition of TiO2 to unsaturated soils within landfarming setting may not be a feasible approach. Nevertheless, less than 1% of UVA (7.5 mW/cm2) or UVC (1.4 mW/cm2) penetrated beyond 0.3 cm soil depth, indicating that limited light penetration through soil would hinder the ability of TiO2 to enhance soil bioremediation under land farming conditions.

Cite this article

Yu Yang , Hassan Javed , Danning Zhang , Deyi Li , Roopa Kamath , Kevin McVey , Kanwartej Sra , Pedro J.J. Alvarez . Merits and limitations of TiO2-based photocatalytic pretreatment of soils impacted by crude oil for expediting bioremediation[J]. Frontiers of Chemical Science and Engineering, 2017 , 11(3) : 387 -394 . DOI: 10.1007/s11705-017-1657-8

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by Chevron Energy Technology Company. We really appreciate the help from Dr. Rosa Krajmalnik-Brown and Dr. Anca G. Delgado at Arizona State University. Any results, conclusions, and recommendations expressed in this research are those of the authors, and do not necessarily reflect the views of Chevron.

Electronic Supplementary Material

Supplementary material is available in the online version of this article at http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11705-017-1657-8 and is accessible for authorized users.
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