NASA Announces 2005 Invention of the Year
Environmental Cleanup Technology Earns Top Honors

A groundwater treatment technology developed at NASA Kennedy Space Center has won NASA’s Government Invention of the Year and Commercial Invention of the Year awards for 2005. This marks the second time in three years that KSC inventors have won both awards.

The Emulsified Zero-Valent Iron (EZVI) technology was developed by a team of researchers from NASA and the University of Central Florida. NASA inventors include Dr. Jacqueline Quinn, an environmental engineer in the Applied Sciences Division of the Kennedy Applied Technology Directorate, and Kathleen Brooks, an analytical chemist in the center’s Materials Science Laboratory of the Center Operations Directorate. Drs. Christian Clausen, Cherie Geiger and Debra Reinhart are co-inventors from the university’s Departments of Chemistry and Civil Environmental Engineering.

During the early history of the space program, the ground around Launch Complex 34 (LC-34) at Kennedy Space Center was polluted with chlorinated solvents used to clean Apollo rocket parts. Dense non- aqueous phase liquids (DNAPLs) were left untreated in the ground and contaminated the fresh water sources in the area. A DNAPL is a liquid that is denser than water and does not dissolve or mix easily in water. DNAPLs are a common cause of environmental contamination at thousands of DOE, DOD, NASA and private industry facilities. The EPA has reported that DNAPLs are present at 60-70 percent of all sites on the Superfund National Priorities List. Current approaches for remediation of DNAPL source areas are either inefficient, slow or costly.

A grout pump is being used to directly inject EZVI into columns of emulsion. This technique is typically used for smaller jobs such as dry cleaning facilities.

In response to this environmental contamination, KSC developed Emulsified Zero-Valent Iron (EZVI) for the in situ treatment of DNAPLs. EZVI shows significant promise as a cost-effective remediation technology capable of expediting DNAPL source zone remediation and groundwater cleanup. The EZVI is composed of a food-grade surfactant, biodegradable vegetable oil, water and ZVI particles (either nano- or micro-scale iron), which form emulsion particles that contain the ZVI in water surrounded by an oil-liquid membrane. Since the exterior oil membrane has hydrophobic properties similar to that of DNAPL, the emulsion is miscible with the DNAPL. Encapsulating the ZVI in a hydrophobic membrane protects the nano-scale iron from other groundwater constituents that would otherwise exhaust much of the reducing capacity of the nano-scale iron.

DNAPL, especially of the magnitude present at LC-34, is likely to persist in the aquifer for several decades or even centuries. The resulting groundwater contamination and plume also will persist for several decades. The conventional approach to this type of contamination is to use pump-and-treat systems that extract and treat the groundwater above ground. This conventional technology is basically a plume control technology and would have to be implemented as long as groundwater contamination exists. The EZVI application is an innovative in situ technology that will greatly exceed the capabilities of conventional pump-and-treat systems both in time to achieve cleanup and cost avoidance. By encapsulating the reactants in a hydrophobic membrane of oil, the emulsion behaves like a DNAPL. When placed in the subsurface, it attracts the contaminant into the hydrophobic membrane, and the reactant then attacks the contaminant and successfully removes the DNAPLs. Other technologies inject reactants in water slurries, and since the DNAPLs are hydrophobic, the contaminants reject the “treatment remedy” and the problem remains.

EZVI team members (left to right) include Dr. Christian Clausen, Dr. Jacqueline Quinn, Kathleen Brooks, Dr. Debra Reinhart, and Dr. Cherie Geiger.

EZVI overcomes the previous understanding that the incorporation of zero-valent metal particles, such as iron particles, into a liquid membrane micelle would lead to passivation of the particle surface with regard to its ability to dehalogenate compounds. Kinetic studies have shown that the dehalogenation rates of zero-valent metal emulsions are very high and, in fact, are much higher than free zero-valent metal particles with regard to the dehalogenation pools of pure DNAPL. A beneficial feature of the zero-valent metal emulsion is that no halogen-containing atoms exit from the micelle during remediation.

This technology is one of the few methods available that can treat the DNAPL source. EZVI overcomes the limitations of current DNAPL treatment technologies by providing a method that is quick, effective and cost-competitive. Other benefits of the innovation include direct treatment of the contaminant source; contaminants are not mobilized; produces less toxic and more easily degradable by-products; and it is environmentally safe. The relatively low injection costs and long-term residual remediation activity indicate that EZVI can result in significant operational lifetime cost savings.

A researcher shows the emulsion in the soil.

KSC has signed five nonexclusive licenses with companies wanting to market and further develop EZVI. One company in particular, GeoSyntec, intends to market this innovation to clients across North America, Europe and Australia. Additionally, GeoSyntec also has been awarded funding from the DOD Environmental Security Technology Certification Program (ESTCP) to enhance the application of this technology through further laboratory and field demonstrations. GeoSyntec completed demonstration testing of the EZVI technology at the Cape Canaveral Air Station Launch Complex 34 (LC-34) under the NASA STTR program in 2002 and 2003. As of April 2006, EZVI has been applied at both government and private industry cleanup sites by the other four licensees in Arkansas, Tennessee, Florida, North Carolina and Illinois.

Recipients/technology end-users of the EZVI cleanup technology include government installations, local and state governments and private industry. Cleanup programs across five federal agencies aimed at DNAPL removal are estimated to exceed $200 billion over the next 75 years (Soil and Groundwater, August/September 1997). EZVI will help to address these problems within the federal government and across private industry. New and continued relationships were established during the field application of the technology with the EPA Superfund Innovative Technology Evaluation Office and with numerous environmental consultants interested in applying the technology to their customers’ cleanup sites across the United States and other countries. Additionally, a close working relationship was developed with the U.S. Air Force, who chose in 2005 to deploy the largest EZVI injection to date (>62,000 gallons) at Patrick Air Force Base, Florida. Additionally, working relationships with the U.S. Marine Corp and the U.S. Navy are continually developing, as the next EZVI demonstration under the DOD certification program began in May 2006 at Parris Island Marine Training Base, South Carolina. The EPA is again participating in this deployment, with interest in documenting the biological benefit (polishing effects) of the emulsion.

The technology transfer recipients for EZVI are far reaching, from United States government installations like the KSC and Cape Canaveral Air Force Station to local dry cleaner programs such as the one currently funded by the state of Florida. Private industry is deemed a potentially significant user of the technology, as the government is not the sole owner of chlorinated-solvent groundwater pollution. Within the first year of licensing, EZVI has been deployed at four industrial locations with great success and at three locations within the DOD. For one of the DOD deployments, the estimated cost for the EZVI alone is nearly $1 million.

This technology has won the SE Federal Labs Consortium 2005 Excellence in Technology Transfer award, the national Federal Laboratory Consortium Excellence in Technology Transfer Award for 2006, the NASA 2005 Invention of the Year Award and the 2005 NASA Commercial Invention of the Year Award.

NASA Official: Janelle Turner • Web Design: Printing & Design Office, NASA Headquarters • Credits