Engineering Properties of Chromium Contaminated Soils

Abstract

Soil and groundwater contamination occurs with the industrial activities. Majority of such contaminated sites are in urban areas. With the recent interest by millennial generation or generation Y to live in urban areas, there is a tremendous demand for urban land. Hence some of those contaminated sites will be remediated for residential purposes while others will be developed as brownfield sites for retail purposes. For contaminated soil to be treated or contaminated sites to be used as brownfield sites, one should have a comprehensive understanding of engineering properties of contaminated soils. This manuscript describes such situation where engineering properties of chromium contaminated soils were used to evaluate the feasibility of such soils to be used as construction material or treated and used in brownfield sites. Chromium contaminated soils from nine contaminated sites in New Jersey were subjected to several physical and chemical tests to determine their engineering properties. In addition advanced instrumentation such as environmental scanning electron microscope (ESEM) and X-ray diffractometer (XRD) were used to evaluate the feasibility to use chromium contaminated soils as construction material or remediated and used in brownfield sites. The physical test results were compared with New Jersey Department of Transportation (NJDOT) and ASTM specifications for use as a construction material as well as to remediate the soil. The chemical test results and information obtained from advanced instrumentation were analyzed to determine the long-term impact of using chromium contaminated soils as construction material or remediated and used in brownfield sites. Based on test results it was found that chromium contaminated soils from nine sites are not suitable candidates for either entrapping the contaminants using cement or asphalt or to use as a construction material in brownfield sites.