Mitigating Airborne PCB Emissions from Sediments with Black Carbon Materials and PCB-Degrading Biofilms

Goal: Provide environmental science and engineering solutions to decrease the flux of airborne PCBs at Superfund sites.

Objective: Develop novel synergistic coupled sorptive and reactive black carbon materials (e.g., biochars) containing aerobic PCB-degrading biofilms and evaluate the efficacy of these materials to remove LC-PCBs from sediments under variable salinity, temperature, and dissolved oxygen concentrations.

Aims:

1) Optimize tailored black carbon materials with sorptive and reactive properties toward LC-PCBs and the ability to host aerobic PCB-degrading biofilms.

2) Evaluate the performance of black carbon materials containing aerobic PCB-degrading biofilms to lower LC-PCB concentrations in water and air under relevant environmental conditions.

3) Scale up production of biofilm-coated black carbon materials and demonstrate the feasibility of decreasing airborne PCB flux from contaminated sediments at the mesocosm-scale.