Electrodialytic Remediation of PFAS-Contaminated Soil

Abstract: Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) are a group of anthropogenic aliphatic compounds, widelyknown for their environmental persistence and toxicity to living beings. While they are ubiquitous in theenvironment, interest has been focused on contaminated soil, which can act as a primary recipient andsource of groundwater contamination. Electrokinetic technology is based on the movement of ionsunder the effect of an electric field. This could be a promising remediation solution, since PFASs areusually present in their anionic form. The contaminants can then be concentrated towards the anode,thus reducing a plume’s volume and possibly extracting the substances from soil. The preliminary aimof the present study was to evaluate the potential of using electrodialysis for the remediation of PFAScontaminatedsoil for the first time. Experiments were run with natural contaminated soil samples,originating from a fire-fighting training site at Arlanda Airport, and at Kallinge, Sweden, as well as inartificially spikedsoil. Electrodes were placed in electrolyte-filled chambers and separated by the soilwith ion-exchange membranes for pH-control. In total, five experiments were conducted. Two differentsetups were tested, a typical 3-compartment EKR cell and a 2-compartment setup, to allow for pHincrease and facilitate PFAS desorption. Two different current densities were tested; 0.19 mA cm-2 and0.38 mA cm-2. After twenty-one days, soil was cut in ten parts lengthwise and triplicate samples wereanalysed for PFAS concentrations, with HPLC-MS/MS. Sixteen out of the twenty-six screened PFASswere detected above MDL in the natural soil samples. The majority of the detected PFASs showed apositive trend of electromigration towards the anode, under both current densities, with only longerchainedcompounds (c>8) being immobile. This can be attributed to the stronger sorption potential oflong-chained PFAS molecules, as has been reported in previous sorption studies. Mass balancedistribution for a high current density (0.38 mA cm-2) experiment revealed that 73.2% of Σ26PFAS wasconcentrated towards the anode, with 59% at the soil closer to the anode, 5.7% at the anion exchangemembrane and 8.5% at the anolyte. It also showed higher mobility for short-chained molecules (c≤6),as they were the only compounds to be extracted from soil and be concentrated in the anolyte. Highercurrent densities were not directly correlated with higher electromigration rates, as to the lack of massbalance data for the low current density experiments. Regardless, electrodialysis could be a viable optionfor PFAS soil remediation and further research to encourage the understanding of the migrationmechanism, as well as combination with other treatment methods is encouraged.