The article below is excerpted from SERDP and ESTCP’s Partners in Environmental Technology Information Bulletin, Summer 2010 Issue. 

ESTCP Principal Investigator Dr. Patrick Evans and colleagues from CDM who were awarded the American Academy of Environmental Engineers’ (AAEE) 2010 Superior Achievement Award for Environmental Engineering Excellence for their work on in situ remediation of perchlorate in vadose zone soil using gaseous electron donors. Perchlorate is a highly mobile groundwater contaminant widely used as an oxidizer in rocket fuel, munitions, fireworks, and road flares. Treatment technologies for groundwater contamination to date have not been successful in addressing source contamination in soil leaching into groundwater. Under ESTCP project ER-200511, CDM used its patented gaseous electron donor injection technology to demonstrate that indigenous bacteria in soil will consume perchlorate and nitrate in the presence of injected hydrogen gas.