Silt fences have been in use on construction sites in the United States and elsewhere to protect nearby water bodies from sediments carried by rainwater. Like other geosynthetic applications, silt fences are evolving technologically and becoming more important for environmental protection.
A new series of geocomposites used to manufacture silt fences with much improved environmental protection capabilities has recently been developed and is being tested in the United States. This new generation of silt fences has dual function: to temporarily control sedimentation and to absorb or adsorb pollutants from storm water. Different reactive silt fence configurations, composed of particular capturing layers, can capture at least one of hydrocarbons, heavy metals, phosphates, volatile organic compounds (VOCs), trichlorobenzenes (TCBs), nitrates, arsenic, mercury, mineral oil, oil, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), non-aqueous phase liquids (NAPLs), and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH).
This paper will provide an introductory explanation regarding the use of silt fences and related regulations. It will focus on a particular configuration to capture hexavalent chromium (Cr (VI)), lead (Pb), uranium (U), mercury (Hg) and selenium (Se) from contaminated water. It will describe the development and functioning of the reactive silt fence, its components, geosynthetic characteristics, discuss its capabilities and testing. It will also provide performance and general comparisons to older generation silt fence products. Besides the additional function, improvements were also made to the general setup of the system in order to minimize potential structural failures; such enhancements will be described as well.
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