Remediation of hazardous waste sites for protection of wildlife: Development of remedial goal options
- Oak Ridge National Lab., TN (United States). Environmental Sciences Div.
The final step in an ecological risk assessment of hazardous waste sites is to suggest remedial goal options (RGOs). RGOs feed into the Feasibility Study as suggested clean-up targets, that if met, should reduce or eliminate ecological risks. Because wildlife are exposed through multiple media, development of RGOs for their protection have been problematic. This paper presents an approach for the development of RGOs for protection of individual wildlife and populations. Individual-level RGOs were calculated based on soil concentration and soil-to-biota contaminant uptake factors. Soil concentrations were manipulated and exposure estimates iteratively recalculated to generate exposure estimates equivalent to the LOAEL. The RGO is equivalent to this soil concentration. If a contaminant presented risks to more than one species, the final RGO was set to the lowest RGO calculated. If the final RGO was less than background, the RGO was set to the background concentration. To recommend sites for remediation to reduce population-level risk to an acceptable level, Monte Carlo simulations of exposure were recalculated, with exposures at the most contaminated sites set to either zero (for organics) or to background (for inorganics). This approach focuses on the most contaminated sites with the goal of reducing population-level risk to an acceptable level. As a consequence, some sites, where point estimates of exposure indicate risks may be present, will not be recommended for remediation. While these sites may present a hazard to individuals that use these sites extensively, remediation is not required to prevent risks at the population-level.
- OSTI ID:
- 452089
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-961149-; TRN: IM9715%%121
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 17. annual meeting of the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry: partnerships for the environment - science, education, and policy, Washington, DC (United States), 17-21 Nov 1996; Other Information: PBD: 1995; Related Information: Is Part Of SETAC 17. annual meeting -- Abstract book. Partnerships for the environment: Science, education, and policy; PB: 378 p.
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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