The fate of hydrophobic organic contaminants (HOCs) in ground water is highly affected by the distribution and property of the carbonaceous materials (CMs) in subsurface sediments. CMs in soils consist of organic matters (e.g., cellulose, fulvic acid, humic acid, humin, etc.) and black carbon such as char, soot, etc. The distribution and property of CMs are governed by source materials and geological evolution (e.g., diagenesis, catagenesis, etc.) of them. In this study, the distribution and property of CMs in subsurface sediments near the Imjin river in the Republic of Korea and HOC sorption property to the subsurface sediments were investigated. The organic carbon contents of sand and clay/silt layers were about 0.35% and 1.37%, respectively. The carbon contents of condensed form of CMs were about 0.13% and 0.45%, respectively. The existence of black carbon was observed using scanning electron microscopes with energy dispersive spectroscopy. The specific surface areas (SSA) of CMs in heavy fraction(HFrCM) measured with N2 were $35-46m^2/g$. However, SSAs of those HFrCM mineral fraction was only $1.6-4.3m^2/g$. The results of thermogravimetric analysis show that the mass loss of HFrCM was significant at $50-200^{\circ}C$ and $350-600^{\circ}C$ due to the degradation of soft form and condensed form of CMs, respectively. The trichloroethylene (TCE) sorption capacities of sand and clay/silt layers were similar to each other, and these values were also similar to oxidzed layer of glacially deposited subsurface sediments of the Chanute Air Force Base (AFB) in Rantoul, Illinois. However, these were 7-8 times lower than TCE sorption capacity of reduced layer of the Chanute AFB sediments. For accurate prediction of the fate of hydrophobic organic contaminants in subsurface sediments, continuous studies on the development of characterization methods for CMs are required.

Keywords: Hydrophobic organic contaminants;Carbonaceous materials;Sorption;Thermogravimetric analysis;