Cost-Competitive, Environmentally-Friendly Fixatives with Embedded Intelligence for Dust Management at Contaminated Sites

The Department of Energy is seeking an effective and versatile alternative to water for dust suppression at hazardous sites during demolition, construction, soil/sediment excavation and trucking.While water is abundant and cheap, frequent applications are required.Water is also ineffective to lock-down the loose surface contaminants in place.Consequently, wind and rain disperse hazardous contaminants into the air or groundwater, far from the source.These conditions pose regulatory and health concerns to site personnel and the general public resulting in a cost burden of cleanup to the tax payer. The project team is developing DustSafe as an effective fixative for airborne and loosely-held contaminants on any surface.The embedded additives would increase the efficiency of trapping the contaminants into the coating and help visualizing their presence through distinct color formation.DustSafe can be customized for specific hazards for use in other nuclear or hazardous remediation sites.The coated surface will be durable to erosion and mechanical fracture to ensure that dust or contaminants are not released or airborne. Phase I has demonstrated DustSafe to effectively wet and fix airborne particles or surface contaminants.DustSafe formed a very effective barrier layer on a soil simulant, preventing particles from being released into the air when tested with pressurized air or water, simulants for wind and rain erosion.In all tests, DustSafe outperformed water demonstrating visual indication of the presence of Chromium and Uranium contaminants on drywall and soil surfaces.A capture efficiency of 93% was achieved for the target contaminants. The Phase II project will focus on refining DustSafe efficacy while emphasizing greener formulations.Based on industry interest and input from subject matter experts, the optimized DustSafe will be benchmarked against commercial products to validate its performance by rigorously-testing under simulated field conditions.We will identify partners and sites for testing. DustSafe will offer a cost-competitive solution to dust mitigation at nuclear or industrial waste remediation sites.It is anticipated that the costly clean up events due to loss of contaminant control and health risks can be averted with the more targeted solution that DustSafe offers.