Li, F., S. Guo, B. Wu, and S. Wang. | Chemosphere 244:125467(2020)

A 182-day pilot study was conducted at Shenyang former Coking Plant in China to remove PAHs (total PAHs of 5,635.6 mg/kg) from the soil using three treatments: control treatment (without inoculation or electric field), bioremediation with inoculation, and electro-bioremediation with inoculation and electric field. Treatments were conducted from May to October under natural conditions. Results show that electro-bioremediation enhanced the removal of PAHs, especially high-ring (>3 rings) PAHs. At 182 days, the degradation extents of total PAH reached 69.1% and 4-6-ring PAHs reached 65.9% (29.3% and 44.4% higher, respectively, than those under bioremediation alone). After electro-bioremediation, the total toxicity equivalent concentrations also were reduced. Electro-bioremediation effectively removed PAHs and reduced the health risks of soil at the site. Also, electro-bioremediation with polarity reversal could maintain uniform soil pH, the degradation extent of PAHs, and soil microorganism numbers at all sites. The environmental conditions, such as temperature and rainfall, had little influence on the process of electro-bioremediation.