Bulk Capping & Active Capping
Application Description![](/portals/9/Images/RCM.JPG)
As attention turns toward contaminated sediment remediation, traditional remediation methods, such as dredging and sand caps, provide widely varying results due to many environmental, operational, and economic factors. As a result, active capping continues to offer many advantages which can be tailored to each specific application, including both partial and full sediment capping.
Sediment capping involves the sub-aqueous placement of a barrier layer of material over contaminated sediment, reducing the potential for contaminant exposure by preventing resuspension and transport to other non-affected areas. While thick sand caps make sense in certain situations, CETCO provides Reactive Core Mat® (RCM), eliminating the need for a thick and costly sand cap.
CETCO Provides
- Granular Organoclay®, offered in both bulk and defined mass per unit area, creates a permeable barrier for contaminated soil and solids in river and stream beds.
- Organoclay® MRM, specially designed for mercury and arsenic removal, can be used in capping applications to provide a permeable barrier in situations where either of these two metals are present in the contaminants.
- Reactive Core MatTM (RCM) is designed to provide a simple method to place active materials into subaqueous sediment caps. RCM allows for thin, stable layers of reactive media to be evenly placed in a very precise manner.
- Triton® Marine Mattresses are used in highly erosive subaqueous applications as a method of placing Reactive Core Mat.
- Pro-TextTM 2000 Sand Mats are designed to be placed over earthen or synthetic surfaces to guard against damage by erosion, scouring, heavy equipment or other forces.
- Bentonite Tablets offer methods to create impermeable barriers for sediment capping applications.
- CETCO Geosynthetic Clay Liners very low permeability, self sealing characteristics, and controlled quality act to isolate contaminants from contact and groundwater in sub-aqueous applications.
Benefits of Utilizing CETCO Technologies
- Reactive capping media available in either bulk or as a reactive mat allowing for wider variety of applications.
- Combinations of reactive core materials allow for a wide range of treatable contaminants.
- Adsorptive capacity reduces required cap thickness, thus increasing navigable depth when compared to traditional methods.
- Composite layer stabilizes sediments, minimizing re-suspension and reducing downstream impact.
- Consistent sheet size allows for highly accurate placement and maximum coverage.
- Product properties insure verifiable coverage of sediments due to fully contained, defined mass per area of reactive material.
- Reduces multi-step dredging process into fast, easily adjustable, consistent installation.
- Reductions in volume of fill material needed combined with speed of installation offer significant economic benefit.
Challenges that exist with traditional methods
- Consistency of protection
- Accuracy of mass removal techniques
- Effect of mass removal upon downstream areas
- Composition of treatable contaminants
- Space considerations of traditional sand caps
- Complexity of sub-aqueous installation
- Cost of dredging and disposal of dredged material