Operating Data of a Funnel & Gate-System with Bio Reactor

Based on the results of an F+E Project (RUBIN) a concept for containing contaminants at the site using a Funnel & Gate - System was developed. Laboratory and column trials were performed in order to optimize the conditions for the removal of contaminants and to minimize toxicity. As a result of these studies, a bioreactor gate with associated funnel elements was selected as the primary method of treating contaminated groundwater. It was essential that the complete breakdown or removal of contaminants in the gate should be achieved under conditions in which sufficient system permeability was maintained to allow the continuous hydraulic function of the Funnel & Gate - System. This led as a result to a concept of a structured controllable reactor and hence away from a purely passive, poorly controllable system to a system with control and intervention possibilities. Between October 2006 and March 2007 a large-scale pilot plant Funnel & Gate - System was constructed with one gate and two funnel wings, each 30 m long. The gate consists of a sedimentation stage, three bioreactors connected in series and an activated carbon stage. In the initial sedimentation stage, iron is extracted from the groundwater in order to prevent blocking in the later bioreactor levels. As oxidation agent hydrogen peroxide is dosed into groundwater at the inlet to the plate clarifier.