Development of the SEAtrace{trademark} barrier verification and validation technology. Final report

In-situ barrier emplacement techniques and materials for the containment of high-risk contaminants in soils are currently being developed by the Department of Energy (DOE). Because of their relatively high cost, the barriers are intended to be used in cases where the risk is too great to remove the contaminants, the contaminants are too difficult to remove with current technologies, or the potential movement of the contaminants to the water table is so high that immediate action needs to be taken to reduce health risks. Assessing the integrity of the barrier once it is emplaced, and during its anticipated life, is a very difficult but necessary requirement. Science and Engineering Associates, Inc., (SEA) and Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) have developed a quantitative subsurface barrier assessment system using gaseous tracers in support of the Subsurface Contaminants Focus Area barrier technology program. Called SEAtrace{trademark}, this system integrates an autonomous, multi-point soil vapor sampling and analysis system with a global optimization modeling methodology to locate and size barrier breaches in real time. The methodology for the global optimization code was completed and a prototype code written using simplifying assumptions. Preliminary modeling work to validate the code assumptions were performed using the T2VOC numerical code. A multi-point field sampling system was built to take soil gas samples and analyze for tracer gas concentration. The tracer concentration histories were used in the global optimization code to locate and size barrier breaches. SEAtrace{trademark} was consistently able to detect and locate leaks, even under very adverse conditions. The system was able to locate the leak to within 0.75 m of the actual value, and was able to determine the size of the leak to within 0.15 m