Plasma-driven Destruction of PFAS in Complex Water Matrices: Pilot-scale Demonstration

With the recent release of actionable regulations setting maximum allowable levels of PFAS in drinking water and further regulations expected to follow, the market need for technologies that can destroy PFAS in water is higher than ever. Several technologies are being developed to address this need, but they have yet to reach widespread adoption due to high operational costs and limited throughput capabilities. Plasmas have demonstrated cost-efficient destruction of PFAS but have yet to be demonstrated at commercial scales. Fourth State is developing a plasma reactor that uses an innovative geometric approach to optimize PFAS destruction by enhancing the plasma-liquid contact area and leveraging turbulent flow to destroy both long- and short-chain PFAS without the use of additives. Only electricity is needed; thus, the technology represents a green approach that has demonstrated effective, cost-efficient, non-selective destruction of PFAS and other contaminants in a range of groundwaters with no secondary waste streams. In Phase I, the Fourth State plasma reactor destroyed PFAS in landfill leachate containing multiple co-contaminants and scavengers, thus demonstrating the technical feasibility of the reactor to destroy PFAS in complex water matrices and significantly expanding applicable markets beyond groundwaters to include landfill leachates, industrial wastewaters, and concentrates from separation processes. The target markets include the water and wastewater, semiconductor, and landfill industries with a combined global market size exceeding $900B. Plasma-induced precipitation observed in Phase I offers the potential for resource recovery in addition to PFAS and other organic contaminant destruction. While the destruction performance of the Fourth State reactor is competitive with the leading alternative technologies, scale-up to commercially practical flow rates must still be demonstrated. The objective of this Phase II project is to conduct a pilot-scale test at a field site, demonstrating scale-up to practical processing flow rates of 5 gallons per minute in a realistic operating environment while simultaneously addressing technical challenges and reducing risk. In parallel, robust process monitoring instrumentation and software will be developed to evaluate the treatment performance for comparison with analytical predictions. Together, these activities will contribute to the development of a reactor system with a high technology readiness level which will serve as the basis for full-scale systems capable of treating throughputs exceeding 50 gallons per minute and can be deployed standalone or integrated into a treatment train for the destruction of PFAS in a range of contaminated waters.