6. Pollution control and recycling applications

Organic pollutants can also be removed from aqueous media or contaminated soils, particularly organochlorines (pesticides, PCBs) which exhibit good solubility in supercritical CO ₂ . The use of mobile units to treat PCB-polluted soil on site has been proposed. Other work has focused on the extraction of mineral compounds using ligands solubilized in CO ₂ (heavy metals, radioactive waste).

On the other hand, supercritical water is a medium that enables highly toxic waste to be incinerated with total efficiency, such as chemical weapons, radioactive organic waste, certain persistent compounds that are refractory to incineration, etc. Several demonstration units are in operation. In the pharmaceutical industry, several companies also use subcritical water oxidation to decontaminate...