Short description:
General description of Multibarrier Demonstration Project (MULTIBARDEM)
Background
Groundwater is the main source of drinking water in Europe. The contamination of this groundwater by contaminated soils or as a result of landfill leaching is one of the major concerns for the European society in the beginning of the 21st century.
The Water framework Directive (and its daughter Directive on groundwater) states that the water and groundwater quality must be improved before the year 2015. So far, ex situ remediation technology, e.g. pump-and-treat system is the most widespread method for remediating polluted sites. But these technologies are expensive and cause major impact on the natural ecosystems of the site being remediated.
Passive Treatment: Remediation of Tomorrow
In the recent years, in-situ treatment is becoming more interesting for aquifer treatment as the technology is developing and becoming more reliable and accepted. In addition hereto, the EU is actively supporting the development of innovating in situ soil remediation technologies, which support a more passive approach to treatment which protects the ecosystems of the specific site. Hence, in situ treatment systems are gaining terrain and new, efficient technologies are needed in this area.
Value for Money MULTIBARRIER is a sustainable solution to the prevention of groundwater contamination by leaking landfills and other point sources of contamination. The MULTIBARRIER offers many advantages because:
- It offers remediation to sites contaminated by mixed pollutants
- It offers a cheap alternative to an expensive complete reinstallation or ex-situ treatment
- It is a passive treatment system
- It is efficient
- It has low maintenance costs
- It requires low energy input
- It has no waste production, no water discharge, or no emissions to the air
The development of passive treatment systems are encouraged by the EU. Not only does this system have no negative impact on the area under treatment, it also offers value for money.
Founded in reality
By application of the MULTIBARRIER system into three different sites in Belgium and Austria, with different characteristics and pollutions problems, the MULTIBARDEM project proves that it is not only a laboratory project. And by communicating the results through various sources, the project will be disseminated and spread out to many different potential users, securing that many will be able to benefit from its findings.