FLUXOLOGY REPORT 1

Catching up on old times. Actually, this letter is that, plus my 1997 marketing campaign. I thought it would be good to drop a letter to all of my favorite teammates and clients and provide some current information on some new and exciting work. This includes first time applications of direct measurement technology and I thought you might like to know what is currently available.

Well, aside from the usual applications of the of flux chamber (or flux box as some of the less fortunate would call it) on landfills, lagoons, and atop contaminated ground water plumes, I conducted some interesting programs that were variations on the theme. Last year I developed and tested an "air infiltration prevention" system that provides for flux testing on hard surfaces (concrete, asphalt, indoor flooring) by sealing the chamber to the surface. I tested the system for chamber seal break-through while generating a steady 4 mph wind at the chamber/surface interface using a floor fan (Figure 1).

I was able to reduce break-through at the chamber seal from 82% to less than 0.5% (detection limit). Not bad! This approach will be useful for exposure studies where the soil gas plume from a subsurface source is under building foundations and parking lots. I also modified a chamber for forced-air flow sources in porous media (compost piles, soil filters, bioventing sites, landfill vents) by adding a 6" diameter exhaust port and a 3' long stack. This adaptation will prevent back-pressure from retarding flow into the chamber on porous media, a problem we never have on liquid aeration tanks (Figure 2). We used it on a beach in southern California as part of a groundwater sparging study to assess impact to the atmosphere during cleanup (Figure 3). It worked great, and as they say, life is a beach.

Another interesting application was on a floating tank roof (digester tank) at a west coast wastewater treatment plant. I constructed an adapter to seal the chamber to the 45° tank wall/lid configuration (Figure 4). The adapter is like the ones constructed for testing weirs at wastewater treatment plants (Figure 5) only it was not quite as difficult to construct. We screened the tank seal, identified test locations, and collected fugitive emissions from the tank as a function of time and process condition. As usual, the measured emissions were about half that of the estimated emissions via modeling (yessss!). Other unique projects in the past 18 months included: assessing ozone and PM-10 precursor emissions from the dairy industry (Figure 6) where I learned that dairy cows can be more ornery than bulls!; pilot-scale demonstrations with drummed hazardous waste (Figure 7); material off-gassing study using an indoor chamber; and several hotly debated residential exposure assessments (Figure 8).

Look for two new books (Aspects of Air Pollution at Hazardous Waste Sites and Odor Assessment Using the Flux Chamber) and advances in hazardous waste site air pathway analysis. Let me know if you can use my help on any projects this year. Or just call to say "Hi." Take care friends! Best of luck in the new year.

Still alive and kick'n in Dead Bluff.