Beyond the blaze: Mitigation and innovative management of complex pollutants after major fire at Luton Airport car park

The solution

We arrived on site on day three of the incident to put in place a containment plan to minimise the impact of contaminants on the environment.

The first priority for the team was to isolate and contain contaminants and prevent these from entering the central soakaway. Key receptors, such as the interceptors that take the bulk of surface water run-off from the car park and wider site, were identified. Physical isolations were put in place which allowed the installation of over pump systems to control the flow of rainwater. This was a key priority as heavy rain on site was causing contamination run off from the incident location.

Environmental consultancy services were provided on this project undertaking soil, groundwater, and interceptor sampling to gain a full understanding of the incident and its impacts.

The ground investigation included rotary drilling of five locations approximately 70 metres into the chalk aquifer around the central soakaway to ascertain whether any contamination entered the groundwater.

Data analysis helped to identify the contaminants running off the site and to devise a solution. At a very early stage, it was established that this project would involve dealing with very high levels of hydrocarbon run-off.

Wear systems were installed to remove any free-phase product – anything floating on the water. The water was then passed through a Granular activated carbon (GAC) system to treat the dissolve-phase hydrocarbons. Through this system, the team were able to identify metals from electric vehicle batteries that posed a unique challenge.

To remove these metals, an ion exchange was employed using blend of selective resins to target the heavier metals and, over a period of eight weeks, this methodology was further refined.

We have also supported the demolition works in mitigating any environmental impact through the implementation of an environmental plan. This plan manages surface run-off, the safe removal of vehicles, all fuel-related products and ignition sources, and the construction of a bunded area location for onward transportation at a later date.