Sustain-a-Drain: A Novel Indicative Hydrocarbon Filtration System

Filtration system products for storm drains capture hazardous hydrocarbon oils and heavy metals to prevent environmental contamination. Although these products aid in containing hazardous wastes, they are not reusable and thus increases landfill waste when the filter’s lifetime is complete. Systems with no saturation indicators have uncertainty with treating the contaminants and risk leaving additional waste. The objective of the team, Sustain-a-Drain, is to design and build a reusable storm drain filter insert system with an indicator to facilitate maintenance of storm drains and protect waterways. Based on preliminary testing of a full-scale unit at the University of California, Riverside, the integrated filtration system is comprised of a water diverter, sediment catcher, filter and indicator. The novel and innovative aspect of our system is the indicator. The prototype indicator is designed to allow sediment-laden water to flow through the indicator where a metal mesh directly adjacent to the material can capture oil contaminants. The oil migrates to another compartment where saturation of an oil-absorbing polymer transitions from a powder to an amorphous gel to function as an indicator. Sustain-a-Drain has conducted successful experiments on prototypes that capture hazardous hydrocarbons, and provide indication of oil saturation. The results of this design will show an effective method to indicate proper maintenance times for a storm drain protection system. The indicator is calibrated to the Sustain-a-Drain filter system and activates at levels of saturation of the filter insert. Upon full saturation, the filter can be removed and cleaned with a biodegradable detergent. The extracted contaminants will be treated with flora capable of treating hazardous wastes. The waste removed from the filter will be treated in a bioremediation process using fungi to further remove these wastes. The concentrations of the contaminants in solution will be analyzed to determine the degradation efficiency of the fungi.