| Tool List | Description |
| Geophysics | |
| Surface geophysics | |
| 1. Ground penetrating radar | locate geologic materials based on reflection of electromagnetic pulse between layer of dielectric properties |
| 2. High resolution seismic reflection | seismic reflection for profiling stratigraphic layers to large depths |
| 3. Seismic refraction | seismic refraction for 2D interpretation of lithological layer |
| 4. Electrial resistivity tomography | indicate broad scale lithological variation through ground-based variation in electrical resistivity |
| 5. Electromagnetic conductivity | map lateral variation in EC to identify broad geologic variation or conductive plume |
| Downhole testing | |
| 1. Magnetometric resistivity | map the preferential pathway in fractured or unconsolidated media by magnetometric resistivity |
| 2. Induction resistivity (conductivity logging) | perform inductive measurement of apparent conductivity to recognise appropriate contrasts, variation in lithology and water |
| 3. Resistivity | characterize lithology in terms of EC and conductivity of pore water |
| 4. Ground penetrating radar cross well tomography | used when surface GPR is not useful |
| 5. Optical televiewer | identify fracture and void in the borehole and provide some lithologic information through visual image |
| 6. Acoustic televiewer | utilizing the acoustic pulse reflection to measure the borehole features and charaterize the fracture and other lithologic information |
| 7. Natural gamma log | identify lithology and stratigraphic correlation through detection of gamma radiation from mineral |
| 8. Neutron (porosity) logging | neutron emitted will collide with hydrogen which indicate the porosity and water content |
| 9. Nuclear magnetic resonance logging | nuclear magnetic resonance signal is linearly proportional to water content and can be used to determine porosity |
| 10. Caliper log | with extension of caliper arms, it can detect fracture, measure depth of casing and diameter |
| 11. Temperature profiling | trace the movement of water between boreholes by temperature profiling |
| 12. Full wave form seismic | quantitative measure of material properties by measuring full seismic wave between horeholes |
| Hydraulic testing | |
| Single well tests | |
| 1. Packer testing | isolating a discrete section of well borehole for conducting testing or sampling for representative data |
| 2. FLUTe profiling | Transmissivity profile test |
| 3. Borehole dilution | determine Darcy flux based on dilution of tracer in the well |
| 4. Flow metering | identify inflow and outflow from borehole |
| 5. Partitioning interwell tracer test | characterize amount of NAPL by releasing tracer that can partition into NAPL |
| 6. Pumping and recovery tests | obtain T by pumping and measure groundwater recovery rate |
| 7. Slug tests | monitor the changing head in well and well recovery to measure the T value |
| 8. Constant head step test | pumping test with constant head to measure T value |
| Cross borehole testing | |
| 1. Tracer testing | obtain Darcy flux and average groundwater velocity by adding tracer |
| 2. Hydraulic tomography | run series of pumping test and obtain pressure change at numerous direct pushed monitoring points; use model to find the K value that best fits |
| 3. Pumping and recovery tests | obtain T by pumping and measure groundwater recovery rate |
| 4. Slug tests | monitor the changing head in well and well recovery to measure the T value |
| Vapor and soil gas sampling | |
| 1. Passive soil gas surveys | can target wide range of VOC and SVOC to identify source areas and vapor intrusion pathway, track groundwater contamination and delineate lateral extent of contaminants |
| 2. Active soil gas surveys | apply vacuum to withdraw VOC from sampling area |
| Solid media sampling and analysis methods | |
| Solid media sampling methods | |
| 1. Split spoon sampler | used through hollow stem auger incrementally as the auger is advanced and also with direct push rig to collect soil samples; usually driven by hydraulic hammer and can conduct standard penetration test |
| 2. Single tube solid barrel sampler | soil sampler best used for cohesive formation; driven by hollow stem auger or direct push rig |
| 3. Dual tube sampler | obtain continuous soil core sample with outer casing to protect the borehole wall from collapsing |
| 4. Rock coring | rock coring to obtain sample from bedrock formation |
| Solid media evaluation and testing methods | |
| 1. Core logging | core is logged by geologist for lithology and heterogeneity |
| 2. Percent recovery/rock quality designation | measure rock mass quality from core recovery, lower recovery indicates high permeability zone |
| 3. Contaminant analysis | contaminant analysis in lab or with field instruments |
| 4. Geochemical composition and mineralogy | geochemical information |
| 5. Molecular/microbial diagnostic | indigeous microbe population study |
| Direct push logging (In Situ) | |
| 1. Hydraulic profiling tool (HPT) | direct push probe with injection port that can inject water into formation and measure the pressure required for injection; provide pressure log to characterize lithology and hydrostratigraphy and determine the migration pathway |
| 2. Electrical conductivity (EC) logging | pushed by percussion hammer into formation with electrode where current is applied and the resultant voltage is measured; provide indication of lithology and permeability in soil formation |
| 3. Cone penetrometer testing (CPT) | hydraulic ram supported by weight of truck to push a rod with conical point into ground at steady rate to measure penetration tip resistance, friction, and pore pressure; soil behavior is recored and hydraulic conductivity can be estimated |
| 4. Membrane interface probe (MIP) | advanced by direct push rig, it is a VOC screening tool that use carrier gas to sweep the VOC in the formation and carry it into detector for real time semi-quantitative measurement |
| 5. Laser induced fluorescence (LIF) | advanced by direct push rig, use excitation light to induce fluorescence of PAH compounds and transmit the light uphole to a detection system for quantification; able to measure and delineate the presence of NAPL |
| 6. Hydrosparge (CPT) | integrate with CPT probe that reach groundwater to obtain sample, sparge on to strip the VOC with carrier gas and detect the chemical aboveground |
| 7. CPT in-situ video camera | A CPT probe with miniature imaging video camara that can illuminate soil when probe is in contact with soil; provide direct evidence of NAPL presence and delineate stratigraphy |
| 8. Raman spectroscopy | similar to LIF but use a longer wave length infrared laser to excite the energy state of contaminant; under the light exposure, the molecules in compound present scatter light with distintive vibrational fingerprint for characterization |
| 9. Co-solvent injection/extraction | add tracer and alcohol in sequence into NAPL contaminated formation to solubilize and mobilize, compare the extraction result of NAPL, alcohol and tracer concentration to determine the presence of DNAPL using mass balance approach |
| 10. Targost | LIF tar specific screening tool |
| 11. Dye LIF | inject fluorescent hydrophobic dye to ensure DNAPL fluorescent even without sufficient fluorophores or PAH; sensative to chlorinated solvent |
| Groundwater sampling | |
| Discrete groundwater sampling & profiling | |
| 1. Groundwater sampling tool | groundwater sampling tool that has screen exposed to sampling intervals and can be temporarily installed on site by direct push rig; it can be also used to conduct slug test. Tools can be either installed for sampling at discrete depth or multilevel fro groundwater profiling |
| 2. Waterloo advnaced profiling system | direct push groundwater profiling tool that can obtain groundwater sample at several discrete depth with low flow sampling; can also acquire hydraulic data |
| 3. Grab well water sampler | passive groundwater sampling that can minimize the interference to the groundwater sample quality |
| 4. Accumulative sorbent sampler | passive sampling device that rely on diffusion and sorption to accumulate into the sampler; good for VOC and SVOC. |
| 5. Membrane diffusion sampler | rely on groundwater flow through a screened interval and equilibrium diffusion of dissolved chemical through polyethylene film |
| 6. FLUTe system | map the distribution of contaminant in the pore space and fracture of borehole wall using activated carbon coating on the liner |
| 7. Passive flux meter | use sorptive permeable medium to passively intercept contaminated groundwater and release resident tracer; after specified residence time retrieve the medium and remaining tracer for contaminant and groundwater flux |
| 8. Hydropunch | a stainless steel and Teflon sampling tool that can collect discrete interval groundwater samples through a small-diameter drive pipe |
| 11. ZONFLO-hydraulic sampling system | based on hydraulic control of borehole flow conditions to isolate flow from discrete fracture zone while take groundwater samaple |
| 12. Groundwater sampling pumps | low flow purging groundwater sampling pump and other sampling device |
| Multilevel sampling | |
| 1. Wesbay system | multi-level sampling modular system with packers to isolate different flow zone |
| 2. Solinst system | a permanent modular system with sampling ports at multiple depth isolated by packers |
| 3. FLUTe system | continuous flexible urethane coated nylon fabric tube to seal borehole with spacer between the liner and the borehole wall to create sampling/monitoring zone at multiple depth |
| 4. CMT (Continuous multichannel tubing) | system uses polyethylene tubing with several chambers which are converted into several depth-discrete monitoring tube |
| DNAPL | |
| 1. NAPL FLUTe system | FLUTe liner system with hydrophobic cover that can be stained by NAPL; provide NAPL depth distribution |
| 2. Dye techniques | provide direct visual detection of NAPL in soil or water by adding hydrophobic dye |
| 3. Ultra-violet (UV) fluorescence | soil sample can be inspected under UV light for fluorescence which may indicate the presence of NAPL containing PAH or other fluorophores |
| 4. NAPL interface probe | down-well probe to measure the thickness of NAPL by detecting the oil/water interface |
| Chemical screening | |
| 1. Membrane interface probe (MIP) | advanced by direct push rig, it is a VOC screening tool that uses carrier gas to sweep the VOC in the formation and carry it into detector for real time semi-quantitative measurement |
| 2. Background fluorescence analysis | organic compounds that fluoresce in different patterns can be fingerprinted and correlated to plume concentration in the sample; it also indicates hydraulic connection |
| 3. Colorimetric screening | combine sample purging with colormetric gas detector tube to detect total chlorinated halocarbon VOC and estimate the sample concentration |
| 4. Direct sampling ion trap mass spectrometer | direct analysis of VOC from field sample without chromatographic separation |
| 5. Organic vapor analyzer | measure the vapor concentration in the headspace of sampler or core sample void; indicate the presence of NAPL |
| Environmental molecular diagnostics | |
| Microbial diagnostics | |
| 1. Fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) | a molecular biology method used to visualize and enumerate specific types of microorganisms or groups of microorganisms in an environmental sample. |
| 2. Compound specific isotope analysis (CSIA) | used to directly examine individual contaminants to learn both about their original isotopic composition and about any degradation the compound has undergone |
| 3. Enzyme activity probe (EAPs) | chemicals used to detect and quantify specific activities of microorganisms in environmental samples. EAPs transformed the target enzyme into a readily detectable product that can be measured and predicted. |
| 4. DNA microarray | evaluate community composition based on the presence/absence of microbial 16S rRNA genes present in a sample |
| 5. Microbial fingerprinting | provide an overall view of the microbial community, indications of microbial diversity, and insight into the types of metabolic processes occurring in the aquifer |
| 6. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) | test for the presence of the specific microorganism, family of microorganisms, or expressed genes in environmental samples such as soil, water, or sediment |
| 7. Quantitative PCR | quantify the abundance and activity of specific microorganisms or expressed genes in pathways capable of biodegrading contaminants at a contaminated site |
| 8. Stable isotope probing (SIP) | exposing the microbial community to an isotopically labeled substrate (e.g., contaminant) and using the detection of that heavy isotope in a biomarker molecule to indicate microbial metabolism (biodegradation) |
| Stable isotope and environmental tracers | |
| 1. Stable isotope | provide qualitative information on the origin of water that can be used to infer age in some cases |
| 2. Radioactive tracer | calculate the age of groundwater based on the rate of decay of a radioactive isotope and input concentration at the time of recharge into the groundwater system |
| 3. Anthropogenic chemical tracers | Chemical tracers typically have distinct input concentrations at the time of recharge, from being in contact with the atmosphere, that can be used to estimate age |
| 4. Accumulation tracers | This tool is similar to partitioning tracer tests with increased sensitivity to radionuclide detection |
| On-site analytical | |
| 1. Mobile labs | These could include purge and trap GC/MS methods (e.g., USEPA Methods 5035 / 8260) or extraction based GC/MS methods (e.g., USEPA methods 3550 / 8270) |
| 2. Portable gas chromatograph | Portable GCs with halogen- or hydrocarbon-sensitive detectors can be used to produce screening, semiquantitative, and quantitative results in the field. |
| 3. Portable GC/MS | Portable GC/MS systems can be used to produce screening, semiquantitative, and quantitative results in the field |
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