Recent advances in the application of electron beam processing to pollution control

Our research group has been involved in the development of the electron beam process for the destruction of organic hazardous wastes. We have conducted experiments at two facilities. The large scale facility is located in Miami at the Virginia Key Waste water Treatment Plant. A second, smaller unit, has been configured as a mobile facility that has conducted studies in the US, and, Germany and Switzerland. The large scale facility, the Electron Beam Research Facility (EBRF), is a 75 kW, 1 MeV, 50 mA horizontal beam. We are able to treat waters of different quality, raw waste water, secondary waste water, potable water and sewage sludge at 0.38 to 0.45 m3 per minute. We have also equipped the facility with holding tanks 9.4, 17.4 and 22.6 m3 in volume. With these tanks we are able to conduct batch studies using water of various quality to make up aqueous solutions of different hazardous waste(s). Early studies were conducted on waters containing up to 3% solids (clay) to determine the application of the process to slurried solids. Recently we have conducted several studies on actual slurried soils and sediments at the EBRF. The mobile facility is a vertical, 25 kW, 500 keV, 40 mA, system. It has a variable flow rate capability and is used to conduct feasibility studies from 0.02 to 0.15 m3 per minute. We have conducted studies on over 150 compounds and in most cases have found that the process is efficient in the destruction of these organic chemicals. We have found excellent correlation between empirically derived results to those from the kinetic model. However, we have also found that studies conducted under the controlled conditions in the 'laboratory' environment have little resemblance to real waste waters or contaminated ground waters or sediments encounter. (J.P.N.)