Neighborhood Home Heating Oil Bio Vent Remediation System in NJ Suburb
MAE2 was selected to design and build a remediation system for a backyard home heating oil site in an established residential neighborhood after providing the most responsive and cost effective bid.
The consultant approached MAE2 with a unique and challenging project. A home heating oil tank had leaked, and after removing most of the contaminated soil the consultant recommended a Bio Vent system to remediate the remaining contamination under the homeowner’s property and the neighboring house. There were several challenges that needed to be overcome with the system design. The power supply in the neighborhood was limited to single phase power. The small lot sizes and the quiet neighborhood setting required the system to operate quietly to avoid disturbing the neighbors.
The system needed to have a small footprint to fit in the backyard. Finally the insurance company claim required that the system construction could not exceed a fixed budget.
MAE2 responded to the RFP by proposing a Regenerative Vacuum Pump, in a Custom Sound Enclosure. The Regenerative Vacuum Pump was chosen because it provides the vacuum and flow required and operates at a lower decibel level than other possible pump choices.
The consultant designed the site so that there were two parallel trenches. The Bio Vent system included a custom manifold so that the system could pull a vacuum from one trench and simultaneously draw fresh air into the opposite trench through the custom manifold. The trenches were placed close enough to one another that each trench was within the radius of influence of the other trench. This allowed the vacuum influence to introduce fresh air to the subsurface and provide oxygen to support the bio degradation of the fuel contamination.
A Custom Sound Enclosure was built to keep the sound of the blower from disturbing the neighboring homes. The system has removable side panels to provide easy access to the equipment and insulated sound hoods and sound insulation inside the walls. The sound enclosure completely mitigated the equipment operating noise.
The system required was built using a relay based control panel including a Variable Frequency Drive (VFD). The VFD was added to the control panel because single phase power was the only power supply available. In order for the system to achieve the performance required for vacuum and air flow needed to be successful it required a three phase vacuum pump. The VFD converts the single phase power to three phase power and also offers additional motor protection and motor speed control. Adjusting motor speed provides electrical power savings and also a reduction in operating noise.
The system provides run time hours, amperage levels, and local alarm lights and alarm reset. The system also includes an adjustable operating timer that allows custom user setting so the system can be programmed to automatically run during daytime hours and shut down during nighttime hours.
MAE2 personnel met the consultant onsite to provide system testing, commissioning and operational training.
This Bio Vent Remediation System uses the following components and subsystems
Regenerative Vacuum Blower
Custom Sound Enclosure