Evaluation of micropurging versus traditional groundwater sampling at the Department of Energy`s Kansas City Plant

A field trial comparing the micropurge and the traditional purge and sample method of groundwater sampling was conducted at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Kansas City Plant (KCP) in 1993 and 1994. Duplicate groundwater samples were collected using traditional and micropurge methods, analyzed for selected organic and inorganic constituents, and the results compared statistically. Evaluation of the data using the Wilcoxon Sign Rank test indicates that within a 95% confidence interval, there was no significant difference between the two methods for the site contaminants and the majority of naturally occurring analytes. These analytical results were supported by visual observations with the colloidal borescope, which demonstrated impacts on the flow system in the well when using traditional sampling methods. Under selected circumstances, the results suggest replacing traditional sampling with micropurging based on reliability, cost, and waste minimization.