Phytoscreening as an efficient tool to delineate chlorinated solvent sources at a chlor-alkali facility

Chlorinated ethenes (CE) are among the most common volatile organic compounds (VOC) that contaminate groundwater, currently representing a major source of pollution worldwide. Phytoscreening has been developed and employed through different applications at numerous sites, where it was generally useful for detection of subsurface chlorinated solvents. We aimed at delineating subsurface CE contamination at a chlor-alkali facility using tree core data that we compared with soil data. For this investigation a total of 170 trees from experimental zones was sampled and analyzed for perchloroethene (PCE) and trichloroethene (TCE) concentrations, measured by solid phase microextraction gas chromato…