EM Task 13 - Cone Penetrometer for Subsurface Heavy Metals Detection

Surface and subsurface contamination of soils by heavy metals, including Pb, Cr, Cu, Zn, and Cd has become an area of concern for many industrial and government organizations (1) Conventional sampling and analysis techniques for soil provide a high degree of sensitivity and selectivity for individual analytes. However, obtaining a representative sampling and analysis from a particular site using conventional techniques is time consuming and costly (2) Additionally, conventional methods are difficult to implement in the field for in situ and/or real-time applications. Therefore, there is a need for characterization and monitoring techniques for heavy metals in soils that allow cost-effective, rapid, in situ measurements. The overall objectives of this project are to evaluate potential calibration techniques for the laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS)-CPT instrument, to provide a preliminary evaluation of the LIBS instrument calibration using samples obtained from the field and to provide technical support to field demonstration of the LIBS-CPT instrument at a DOE facility