Abstract
Toluene and decane which are common volatileorganic compounds (VOCs) found in natural gas spills, have beentested for their availability to biodegradation in soil aftervarious times of aging. For this purpose, single compounds wereadded to sterile soil in three concentrations of up to 1000 ppmand aged for 0, 35, and 70 days. After aging, soils were vented,inoculated and then incubated for 31 days. Both compounds wererapidly biodegraded reaching final soil concentrations below 1 ppm, regardless of the aging time. However, some sequestration ofsmall amounts of aged chemical in soil was evident for decane (up to 0.7 ppm), especially when the compound was added in largeramounts of 1000 ppm.
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Liste, HH., Quiñones-Rivera, A. & Tang, J. Availability of Aged Toluene and Decane for Biodegradation in Soil. Water, Air, & Soil Pollution 133, 227–234 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1012918821842
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1012918821842