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Enhanced degradation of trichloroethylene using bentonite-supported nanoscale Fe/Ni and humic acids

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Abstract

Nanoscale zero-valent iron, named nano-Fe0, is a reagent used to degrade trichloroethylene in groundwater. However, the efficiency of nano-Fe0 is moderate due to issues of dispersion and reactivity. As an alternative we synthesized bentonite-supported nanoscale Fe/Ni bimetals, named bentonite-Fe/Ni, to test the degradation of trichloroethylene in the presence of Suwannee River humic acids, as a representative of natural organic matter. 0.1 mmol/L trichloroethylene was reacted with 0.5 g/L of nano-Fe0, bentonite-Fe, Fe/Ni, and bentonite-Fe/Ni nanoparticles. Results show first that without humic acids the reaction rate constants k obs were 0.0036/h for nano-Fe0, 0.0101/h for bentonite-Fe, 0.0984/h for Fe/Ni, and 0.181/h for bentonite-Fe/Ni. These findings show that bentonite-Fe/Ni is the most efficient reagent. Second, the addition of humic acids increased the rate constant from 0.178/h for 10 mg/L humic acids to 0.652/h for 40 mg/L humic acids, using the bentonite-Fe/Ni catalyst. This finding is explained by accelerated dechlorination by faster electron transfer induced by humic quinone moieties. Indeed, the use of 9, 10-anthraquinone-2, 6-disulfonate as a humic analogue gave similar results.

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Acknowledgments

This study was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (41472232, 41272061), Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities and National Innovation Experiment Program for University Students (201411415051). We appreciate Dr. Prof. Gregory V. Lowry (Carnegie Mellon University) for valuable discussion. We also thank the editors and two anonymous reviewers for their instructive comments.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Biogeology and Environmental Geology, China University of Geosciences, Beijing, 100083, People’s Republic of China

    Shihe Wang, Yitong Han, Xi Cao, Dan Zhao & Jiawei Chen

  2. School of Earth Sciences and Resources, China University of Geosciences, Beijing, 10083, People’s Republic of China

    Shihe Wang, Yitong Han, Xi Cao, Dan Zhao & Jiawei Chen

  3. School of Science, China University of Geosciences, Beijing, 10083, People’s Republic of China

    Dezhong Yang

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  1. Shihe Wang
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  2. Yitong Han
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Correspondence to Jiawei Chen.

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Wang, S., Han, Y., Cao, X. et al. Enhanced degradation of trichloroethylene using bentonite-supported nanoscale Fe/Ni and humic acids. Environ Chem Lett 14, 237–242 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10311-015-0548-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10311-015-0548-9

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