Current vapor intrusion (VI) pathway assessment heavily weights concentrations from infrequent (monthly-seasonal) 24 h indoor air samples. This study collected a long-term and high-frequency data set that can be used to assess indoor air sampling strategies for answering key pathway assessment questions like: "Is VI occurring?", and "Will VI impacts exceed thresholds of concern?". Indoor air sampling was conducted for 2.5 years at 2-4 h intervals in a house overlying a dilute chlorinated solvent plume (10-50 μg/L TCE). Indoor air concentrations varied by 3 orders of magnitude (<0.01-10 ppbv TCE) with two recurring behaviors. The VI-active behavior, which was prevalent in fall, winter, and spring involved time-varying impacts intermixed with sporadic periods of inactivity; the VI-dormant behavior, which was prevalent in the summer, involved long periods of inactivity with sporadic VI impacts. These data were used to study outcomes of three simple sparse data sampling plans; the probabilities of false-negative and false-positive decisions were dependent on the ratio of the (action level/true mean of the data), the number of exceedances needed, and the sampling strategy. The analysis also suggested a significant potential for poor characterization of long-term mean concentrations with sparse sampling plans. The results point to a need for additional dense data sets and further investigation into the robustness of possible VI assessment paradigms. As this is the first data set of its kind, it is unknown if the results are representative of other VI-sites.

Vapor intrusion (VI) pathway assessment and data interpretation have been guided by an historical conceptual model in which vapors originating from contaminated soil or groundwater diffuse upward through soil and are swept into a building by soil gas flow induced by building underpressurization. Recent studies reveal that alternative VI pathways involving neighborhood sewers, land drains, and other major underground piping can also be significant VI contributors, even to buildings beyond the delineated footprint of soil and groundwater contamination. This work illustrates how controlled-pressure-method testing (CPM), soil gas sampling, and screening-level emissions calculations can be used to identify significant alternative VI pathways that might go undetected by conventional sampling under natural conditions at some sites. The combined utility of these tools is shown through data collected at a long-term study house, where a significant alternative VI pathway was discovered and altered so that it could be manipulated to be on or off. Data collected during periods of natural and CPM conditions show that the alternative pathway was significant, but its presence was not identifiable under natural conditions; it was identified under CPM conditions when measured emission rates were 2 orders of magnitude greater than screening-model estimates and subfoundation vertical soil gas profiles changed and were no longer consistent with the conventional VI conceptual model.

Vapor intrusion (VI) investigations often require sampling of indoor air for evaluating occupant risks, but can be confounded by temporal variability and the presence of indoor sources. Controlled pressure methods (CPM) have been proposed as an alternative, but temporal variability of CPM results and whether they are indicative of impacts under natural conditions have not been rigorously investigated. This study is the first involving a long-term CPM test at a house having a multiyear high temporal resolution indoor air data set under natural conditions. Key observations include (a) CPM results exhibited low temporal variability, (b) false-negative results were not obtained, (c) the indoor air concentrations were similar to the maximum concentrations under natural conditions, and (d) results exceeded long-term average concentrations and emission rates under natural conditions by 1-2 orders of magnitude. Thus, the CPM results were a reliable indicator of VI occurrence and worst-case exposure regardless of day or time of year of the CPM test.

In situ thermal‐based soil and aquifer remediation technologies (e.g., electrical resistance heating [ERH], conductive heating, and steam‐based heating) have undergone rapid development and application in recent years. These thermal technologies offer the promise of more rapid and thorough treatment of nonaqueous phase liquid (NAPL) source zones; however, their field‐scale application has not been well documented in the technical literature. A state‐of‐the‐practice review of the application of these technologies was conducted in this study. Available documents from 182 applications were reviewed, which included 87 ERH, 46 steam‐based heating, 26 conductive heating, and 23 other heating technology applications conducted between 1988 and 2007. Approximately 90% of the 182 applications were implemented after 1995 and about half since 2000. More specifically, this review identified the geologic settings in which these technologies were applied, chemicals treated, design parameters, operating conditions, and performance metrics. The results of this study are summarized in a table linking this information to five generalized geologic scenarios. Practitioners considering thermal technologies for their site can identify the geologic scenario that most closely resembles their site and then can quickly see which technologies have been applied in that setting, the designs employed, operating conditions, and the performance achieved.

Data requirements for assessing the significance of the soil vapor intrusion pathway are evolving, and the collection and interpretation of subslab and near-slab soil-gas samples are under discussion. The potential for different assessment paradigms for aerobically biodegradable and recalcitrant chemicals is also frequently debated. In this work, the soil-gas distribution beneath and around a slab-on-grade building overlying shallow (0.5 to >1.5 m below ground surface) petroleum hydrocarbon-impacted coarse alluvial soils was studied. The study spanned about 12 months, including the sampling of soil-gas hydrocarbon and oxygen concentrations, subslab soil vs. building pressure differentials and included weather conditions. Three-dimensional soil-gas concentration ''snapshots'' using samples from 79 soil-gas sampling points are presented here. Significant spatial variability was observed with hydrocarbon and oxygen concentrations ranging from about <0.01 to 200 mg/L and 0 to 21% v/v, respectively. The presence of oxygen and the depth to petroleum-impacted soils appeared to be the dominant factors in controlling the soil-gas distribution; the depletion of hydrocarbons over short lateral and vertical distances (<2 m) was observed in the well-oxygenated regions. Composition data suggest preferential biodegradation of lighter compounds at some points, as reflected in the ratio of the masses of chemicals eluting on the gas chromatography between methane and pentane (C1 and C5) and all others after pentane (>C5).