Mobile PFAS Effluent Treatment System (PETS) for management of Air Force wastes

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are hazardous compounds that were/are released into the environment during routine DoD operations such as fire fighting. As a result, $974M has been spent on PFAS actions to date, including remedial investigation and cleanup. Historically, the resulting wastes were landfilled or incinerated. Now, the DoD is restricted from incinerating these wastes, and large volumes of hazardous waste are building up at Air Force bases across the US. In this SBIR program, AxNano proposes the evaluation of ERDC-developed, patent-pending PFAS Effluent Treatment System (PETS) as a platform for addressing DAF's need to decrease waste volumes and decrease waste management costs. The PETS platform is a mobile, modular waste treatment system that AxNano will further develop to perform temporary, on-site volume reduction of PFAS-laden wastewater. The PETS system has been field demonstrated 3+ times, achieving up to 10,000X volume reduction, and >99.9% removal of PFOS and PFOA, PFAS compounds that have EPA health advisory limits in the parts per quadrillion concentration range.   The objectives of this Phase I are to (1) test our current hypothesis of DAF customer needs; (2) identify technical requirements of PETS to meet DAF needs; (3) refine product-market fit and value proposition.