Citation:
Brassington, K. J., Hough, R. L., Paton, G. I., Semple, K. T., Risdon, G. C., Crossley, J., Hay, I., Askari, K., Pollard, S. J. Weathered Hydrocarbon Wastes: A Risk Management Primer. Critical Reviews in Environmental Science and Technology, Vol. 37(3), May 2007 , pp. 199-232
Abstract:
We provide a primer and critical review of the characterization, risk
assessment, and bioremediation of weathered hydrocarbons. Historically the
remediation of soil contaminated with petroleum hydrocarbons has been expressed
in terms of reductions in total petroleum hydrocarbon (TPH) load rather than
reductions in risk. There are several techniques by which petroleum hydrocarbons
in soils can be characterized. Method development is often driven by the
objectives of published risk assessment frameworks. Some frameworks stipulate
analysis of a wide range of petroleum hydrocarbons; for example, the United
Kingdom (UK) approach suggests compounds from EC5 to EC70 be examined. Methods
for the extraction of petroleum hydrocarbons from soil samples have been
reviewed extensively in the open literature. Although various extraction and
analytical methods are available for petroleum hydrocarbons, their results
suffer from inter-method variation, with gas chromatography methods being used
widely. Currently, the implications for risk assessment are uncertain.
Bioremediation works well for remediating soils contaminated with petroleum
hydrocarbons. As a result, the optimization of environmental conditions is
imperative. For petroleum hydrocarbons in soil, international regulatory
guidance on the management of risks from contaminated sites is now emerging.
There is also growing support for the move toward compound-specific risk-based
approaches for the assessment of hydrocarbon-contaminated land.