Evaluation of Long-Term Leaching of Arsenic from Arsenic Contaminated and Stabilized Soil Using the Percolation Column Test

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript is focused on the use of percolation column tests in order to study the leaching of arsenic from contaminated and stabilized soils in a long period of time. The authors have carried out an extensive process with different types of stabilized soils in column tests and compare the results with TCLP tests.

 

In my opinion, the research is interesting, and the paper is well organized, very well written and easy to follow. The results are promising. However, there are some points that should be revised:

 

Line 96: Please, write the units of the arsenic concentration.

 

Table 1: Please, write H₂O with “2” as subscript.

 

In Supplementary information: I think it would be better and easier to follow if the Supplementary Texts S2 and S3 appear inside the section 2. Materials and Methods in the manuscript.

 

Line 134: Could the authors briefly explain why the used CaCl₂ as eluent?

 

Line 169: Please, write the units of L in capital letter. Remove the dots after the equation.

 

Lines 178-181: I think that this paragraph about the literature review would be better placed after the previous paragraph (in lines 171-176).

 

Lines 211-213: Have the authors used any certified reference materials to validate the methods used for metal analyses? If so, please add the names and the results in the manuscript, as well as the Limit of Detection for each metal.

 

Line 267: I think the Figures S2 and S3 in the Supplementary material are in reverse order. According to the text in the manuscript, Figure S2 should be the Pourbaix diagram for arsenic species and Figure S3 should show the curves for the release of metals.

 

Lines 271-273: Please remove this paragraph.

 

Line 314: Please erase the dots after the equation.

 

Figure 6: Please remove the non significant figures in the y-axis.

 

Figures S3, S4 and S5 (in Supplementary Material) are not named in the manuscript. I think that every supplementary information must be referred in the manuscript.

Author Response

Attached

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

This is very interesting and well-prepared paper. I appreciate all details, especially concerning Materials and Methods, that were provided in the main text and in supplementary file. Only few specific comments are formulated after reading this paper. Please see below:

P3L96 please add unit of As concentration in soil.

What about arsenic content in the used stabilizers. Are all of these stabilizers (except for cement) are safe to be added to soil?

P3L108 on what basis the dosage of soil stabilizer was 5%? Please specify.

P9L310 should be rather concertation than mass.

P10L333-334, P11L357 should be ‘As concentration leached …’ instead of ‘volume of leached As’.

Author Response

Attached

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf