(ClO4-) has emerged as a significant new threat to groundwater
and drinking water supplies and the environment. The Oak Ridge
National laboratory recently developed a new class of
bifunctional anion exchange resins, which are highly selective
for sorption of ClO4- from contaminated groundwater or surface
water. A field experiment demonstrated that the bifunctional
resin was able to treat >100,000 bed volumes of groundwater
before a 10% breakthrough of ClO4- occurred (running at ~2 bed
volumes per minute with an initial ClO4- concentration of The
bifunctional resins are particularly effective in removing trace
quantities of ClO4- in groundwater to below the detection limit
(~1 mg/L). Using pertechnetate (TcO4-) as an analog (with
similar chemical properties as ClO4-), these bifunctional resins
were able to remove TcO4- from contaminated groundwater at below
0.001-ppb levels. No pretreatment is needed to remove either
dissolved organic matter or other competing anions (such as Cl-,
SO42-, HCO3-, or NO3-), which