Poly- and perfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) are a diverse set of organofluorine surfactants that are of great concern to the United States Department of Defense (US DoD) as emerging contaminants due to their potential human and ecosystem health risks. PFASs are persistent in the environment and are recalcitrant to degradation by many traditional remediation strategies. Across industrial sites, military sites, solids applied from water treatment plants, and other sources, there have been widespread contamination leading to large amounts of both solid and liquid wastes. The objective of this project was to demonstrate, as a proof-of-concept, the application of non-thermal plasma technologies for the treatment of PFASs from investigation derived wastes (IDW) from these sites. Specifically, this project focused on degradation of perfluoroalkyl sulfonates (PFSAs), perfluoroalkyl carboxylic acids (PFCAs), and fluorotelomer sulfonates (FtSs) by non-thermal air plasma in lab generated PFAS solutions, synthetic PFAS contaminated matrices, and PFAS contaminated IDW. In the liquid system, which used reverse vortex gliding arc discharges, we demonstrated greater than 90% removal within 60 minutes of treatment for a significant number of PFAS compounds tested. The percent degradation and percent defluorination of the tested PFFASs in the liquid system tended to decrease with shorter chain length PFAAs and FtSs, but minimal differences were observed amount PFCAs, PFSAs, and FtSs with identical perfluoroalkyl chain lengths. In both the solid, which used dielectric barrier discharges (DBD), and the gliding arc liquid treatment systems, shorter chain PFAAs were generated. The promising results from the use of non-thermal plasma for treatment of PFAS contaminated matrices is promising in effectiveness as well as energy efficiency, requiring less than 500-900 kJ/L to achieve the PFAS degradation observed.

Rapid and low energy degradation of PFAS in aqueous solutions by reverse vortex flow gliding arc plasma

Macromolecular Chemistry: The Second Century

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ACS Spring 2020 National Meeting & Expo

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.