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NEW TECHNOLOGIES TO SOLVE OLD PROBLEMS
Citation:
D'Lugosz, J J. NEW TECHNOLOGIES TO SOLVE OLD PROBLEMS. Presented at Chemistry for the Protection of the Environment Meeting, Nanjing, China, September 19, 1999.
Description:
The US Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) was established in early December of 1970 to protect human health and the environment. The USEPA realized from the beginning that to effectively carry out is's mission it needed to encourage the development of new technologies. Almost every major USEPA office promotes a partnership program whereby novel and useful technologies can be recognized. These partnership agreements range from grants for development to establishment of independent testing. In order to be considered, a technology has to pass several questions including relevancy to the USEPA mission, feasibility of development in an acceptable time frame, and cost effectiveness. Esentially, quicker, better and cheaper are the target criteria.
Identification of hydrocarbons in the subsurface can be difficult especially when dealing with both light nonaqueous phase liquids (LNAPLs) and dense nonaqueous phase liquids (DNAPLS). The Tri-Services (Army, Navy, and Air Force) supported through testing by the USEPA, have developed a Site Characterization Analysis Penetrometer System (SCAPS) for identifying sampling and analyzing the physical and chemical characteristics of the subsurface at hazardous waste sites. The SCAPS evaluation was conducted under the USEPA's Superfund Innovative Technology Evaluation Program (SITE). This evaluation demonstrated that the SCAPs system can obtain screening level data quickly and efficiently for both LNAPLs and DNAPLs.
Clean water, especially in developing countries, is sometimes scarce, and very costly tothe local inhabitants. There numerous treatment systems available which can treat water for drinking, but most are not cost effective to place in remote areas where a single well may provide the only water for several families. The USEPA is in the process of evaluating under the Environmental Technology Verification Program, (ETV), a new technology for instu-oxygen generation developed by H2O Technologies, Ltd. and EverClear Technologies Corporation. This new design saturates water with oxygen in a single pass system, thereby eliminating both pathogenic and heterotrophic bacteria. Initial tests have been successful and continued research along with testing under the ETV program should produce a "clean system" capable of continual operation under solar power. This technology has other applications including residential and bottled water purification, cosmetics, pharmaceutical/medical, animal husbandry and food industries.