干旱区生态环境知识资源中心

Over six hundreds of Kuwait's oil wells were exploded during the Iraqi invasion and occupation of Kuwait in 1990, resulting in the worst environmental disaster in man's history. Oil gushed from the destroyed wells, forming more than 300 oil lakes covering 49 km(2) area. Successful efforts by Kuwait Oil Company (KOC) resulted in the recovery of 22 million barrels of crude oil from these lakes, but the lake beds still remain heavily contaminated. The remediation of the oil lake beds is now being actively considered, so that oil contamination does not pose a critical health hazard to man, and also to stimulate the restoration of the damaged ecosystem. In July 1994, a joint research program between Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research (KISR), Japan Petroleum Energy Center (PEG) and Kuwait Oil Company (KOC) was initiated. The project is primarily intended to lay the foundation for rehabilitating Kuwait's environment through the field-scale demonstration of biological and physical-chemical technologies, in order to obtain necessary data to develop an ''Action Plan'' for the remediation of all oil- contaminated desert soil in Kuwait.

A one hectare area of oil lake No. 102 in the Burgan Field site was selected, inspected for mines and explosive objectives and investigated to determine the chemical nature and distribution profile of contamination. Oil penetration was observed as deep as 2.5 meter deep in the subsurface soil and the contaminated material was excavated and hauled to a near by designated area for further treatment (3,013 m(3) oil sludge, 2,012 m(3) heavily to moderately contaminated soil and 5,000 m(3) lightly contaminated soils). Bioremediation technology was selected for the treatment of the contaminated soil and three different methods of this technology are being field evaluated: landfarming, windrow composting soil piles and static piles fitted with forced aeration system. This paper will focus on the results of the site investigation and bioremediation field demonstration.