Chromium electromigration

ISOTRON Corporation s electrokinetic decontamination process is a patented, in situ process for the removal of contaminants from soil, groundwater, and porous concrete. The technology applies a low-intensity direct current (DC) across electrode pairs to facilitate electromigration and electro-osmosis of contaminants. The process works primarily on highly soluble ionized inorganics including alkah metals, chlorides, nitrates, and phosphates. Heavy metals such as lead, mercury, cadmium, and chromium have also responded favorably. 

Pattanayak J, Mondal K, Wiltowski T, Lalvani SB, and Mandich NV. Recovery of metallic impurities from chromium plating solutions by electromigration. Met finishing March 2000 98(3) 39-45. 

Today, these theories of solutions and of electrolytic solutions are used in the analysis of the solvent development of exposed resists, lithographic mask degradation due to corrosion, electromigration of chromium ions, etc. 

In all three experiments, Cr(VI) underwent a substantive decrease in concentration, and the distribution of Cr(T) was modified, indicating the widespread mobilization of chromium and the extensive coeval reduction of Cr(VI) to Cr(III). Accumulation of chromium in the anode chamber shows that electromigration was the predominant driving force for the transport of ions (e.g. Mukhopadhyay, Sundquist, and Schmitz, 2007). Generally, under neutral or high pH conditions, Cr(VI) exists as the soluble and mobile CrOi ion (Reddy et al., 2003) and,to a lesser extent, the dichromate ion Cr207. Reaction of the dichromate ion and the chromate ion to chromic acid occurs only under strongly acidic conditions (e.g. Mukhopadhyay, Sundquist, and Schmitz, 2007) and were most likely not attained in this study. 

In 1996, as part of the Superfund Innovative Technology Evaluation (SITE) Program, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) demonstrated the ISEE system at the SNL chemical waste landfill site in Albuquerque, New Mexico (USEPA, 1998). The ISEE system was developed by SNL for removing hexavalent chromium from unsaturated soil. This was a cutting edge, since most of the laboratory-scale studies were carried out in saturated soil samples. In a saturated sample, the contact of the interstitial fluid with the solid particles is more effective and aids in the extraction and transportation of pollutants. The two primary transport mechanisms in electrokinetics (electromigration and electroosmosis) require a liquid medium (water), but in the unsaturated soil zone, the lack of water in the interstices makes the solubilization and transportation of the heavy metals precipitated or adsorbed on the solid particles surface more difficult. 

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