Black & Veatch Manages Superfund Cleanup

Black & Veatch will manage the construction of a groundwater treatment system that will soon begin at the Smalley-Piper Superfund Site in Collierville, Tennessee.

The EPA says land clearing and other site preparation activities are currently underway. The treatment plant building will be constructed this month, followed by the installation of the treatment equipment in January 2015. The treatment system is expected to be in operation by March 2015 and will initially operate for one year.

The groundwater treatment includes chemical reduction and precipitation followed by ion exchange to remove hexavalent chromium and total chromium. The system is designed to treat up to 100 gallons per minute, or about 52 million gallons of groundwater per year. The treated groundwater will be discharged below ground at the site via an infiltration gallery. Residual sludge generated from the treatment process will be transported off-site for proper disposal. This groundwater treatment follows a soil cleanup that was successfully completed in 2012.

The EPA is funding the cleanup and will continue to coordinate site activities with the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation and the town of Collierville.

More than $14 billion will be spent in 2015 to remove metals, VOCs and other contaminants from groundwater, according to Site Remediation World Markets published in October. by the McIlvaine Company. VOCs are present at more than two-thirds of the Superfund, EPA Resource and Recovery Act and Department of Defense sites and at almost half of the Department of Energy sites.