SUMMARY OF THE REMEDIATION TECHNOLOGIES DEVELOPMENT FORUM
IN-PLACE INACTIVATION AND NATURAL ECOLOGICAL RESTORATION
TECHNOLOGIES (IINERT) SOIL-METALS ACTION TEAM
CONFERENCE CALL

March 16, 1998

On Monday, March 16, 1998, members of the IINERT Soil-Metals Action Team met in a conference call. The following members participated:

Bill Berti, DuPont Central Research and Development (Co-chair)
James Ryan, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) (Co-chair)
Bob Blanchar, University of Missouri
Sally Brown, U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)
Rufus Chaney, USDA
Gary Pierzynski, Kansas State University
Michael Ruby, Exponent Environmental Group (formerly PTI Environmental Services)
Chris Sellstone, Exponent Environmental Group

Also present was Christine Hartnett of Eastern Research Group, Inc. (ERG).

COMMENTS ON THE SUMMARY FOR THE PREVIOUS CONFERENCE CALL

Bill Berti asked the participants whether they had reviewed the draft summary of the previous conference call. He asked the participants to comment on the draft because he is trying to finalize the summary. The participants thought the draft was accurate and did not recommend any changes.

SOIL SURVEY

Sites Identified Through the Soil Survey

Nineteen sites have been identified through the soil survey:

Dr. Berti thinks that the Action Team can get access to all 19 of these sites, but he is not sure of this.

Identifying Lead-Paint-Contaminated Sites

Participants noted that the survey has not captured too many urban lead-paint-contaminated sites. They discussed ways to recruit more sites, both residential and non-residential (e.g., empty lots).

Sally Brown and Michael Ruby were recently contacted by a Brown University undergraduate who may have some leads on potential sites. As part of her senior thesis project, this student has identified residential soils with lead-paint contamination. She plans to amend these soils with phosphorus. Dr. Berti asked whether the student has some sites to volunteer. Dr. Brown noted that the sites might not be good candidates because they have been amended. Mr. Ruby pointed out that the student's plot sizes are small, and it is unlikely that she has been able to amend all of the identified soils. Mr. Ruby agreed to send Dr. Berti the student's e-mail address. Dr. Berti will follow up by sending the student a soil survey.

Rufus Chaney noted that Baltimore has several community garden lots that could serve as potential sites. These lots have a fairly high and consistent level of contaminant concentration. Dr. Chaney thinks the Baltimore sites would be at least as "good" as the Joplin, Missouri site.

James Ryan noted that there is a site in Berkeley that could be sampled. Although one participant thought this particular site fell under the "industrial" category, Dr. Ryan stressed that all of the contaminants are attributable to paint.

The discussion about lead-paint-contaminated soils stimulated a discussion on the best approach for sampling and studying these sites. All agree that lead-paint-contaminated soils are typically highly heterogeneous and that soils must be mixed to create representative samples. Participants' opinions are divided about how best to proceed once soils have been mixed. Opinions fall into two groups:

Make field plots. A couple of participants talked about creating "made" plots, where soils are collected near a house and then homogenized to make an evenly mixed plot. Dr. Berti doubted that residents would be willing to allow investigators to dig up their property, process their yard through a cement mixer, and then put it back in place. Dr. Chaney explained that residents would be provided with clean fill and their contaminated soil would be taken off site. This type of arrangement benefits homeowners (who are anxious to get rid of contaminated soils) and investigators (who would prefer to run their experiments in a controlled environment rather than in the field).

Collect bulk samples. Dr. Brown thought the group might be leaping ahead of themselves by talking about field plots. She thinks a better initial approach would be to concentrate on collecting laboratory samples and then worry about field experiments as the next step. Dr. Ryan echoed her point, noting that it will be very difficult to find urban sites where field plots can be established. He thinks it is better to collect samples from different locations within a site and to create a bulk sample that can be tested in the laboratory. Dr. Brown's experience collecting a bulk sample for the Water Environment Federation-Effect of Biosolids Processing on the Bioavailablity of Pb in Urban Soils study was cited as an example. To identify soils for her sample, Dr. Brown simply called the Childhood Lead Program and asked for the locations of lead-contaminated residential sites. Dr. Brown agreed to send Dr. Berti a contact name at the Childhood Lead Program.

Identifying Orchard Sites

The participants noted that the Action Team needs to identify orchard sites. Chris Sellstone said that one of his colleagues at Exponent Environmental Group has done some proposal work for orchard sites in eastern Washington. He agreed to talk to his colleague about the possibility of the Action Team collecting soil from these orchard sites.

Dr. Chaney said that Frank Peryea is also doing some work in eastern Washington. Peryea has identified two different kinds of soil types in this area:

Soil that is mostly gravelly, mixed with a sandy loam-type material

Soil that is silty loam and has a high lead and arsenic content

Dr. Chaney agreed to follow up with Peryea.

Mr. Ruby talked about an orchard site located in upstate New York. This site has high arsenic concentrations in the soil. (The New York State Department of Conservation keeps asking investigators to delineate the area because the contamination is so extensive.) Mr. Ruby agreed to gather more information about this orchard site.

ACCEPTING AND WAREHOUSING SOILS

Dr. Berti and Dr. Ryan acknowledged that there are some issues to consider before the Action Team starts collecting soils. The most important is determining whether soils are considered "hazardous materials" and if the Team will be held accountable for these wastes once they acquire them. Dr. Berti asked whether the team will have to adhere to certain rules once the wastes come into their possession. Dr. Ryan does not think the archived samples will pose a problem, but suspects that soils used in treatability studies will be an issue. Dr. Ryan thinks the Team will have to conduct total analysis and toxicity characteristic leaching procedure (TCLP) analyses to determine the soil's environmental status. He said the team will be "out of luck" if they choose a soil with a delisted waste because it is nearly impossible to find disposal facilities that will accept these anymore.

Assuming that the IINERT team is able to collect soil, they will need to find a location to store the soil. Neither Dr. Berti nor Dr. Ryan have identified a place to store soils yet. They agreed that they will cross this bridge when they come to it, and encouraged participants to keep gathering information about potential sites.

UPDATE ON ACTIVITIES AT THE JOPLIN FIELD SITE

University of Missouri's Activities

Bob Blanchar provided a summary of the University of Missouri's activities at the Joplin site. This group is conducting dosing studies with swine. To date, three different feedings have been performed:

Field study. The University did a 1% phosphorus field treatment that was dosed to pigs to determine soil-Pb bioavailability. The data for this study has been collected and compiled in a report. Dr. Blanchar has seen a draft report, but does not know if the report has been finalized. He recommended calling Dr. Stan Casteel at the University of Missouri for more information.

Bench-scale study. This dosing involved a 0.5% phosphorus treatment that was incubated at 55 C for one year. The data for this study are currently being analyzed.

USDA's Activities

Like the University of Missouri, the USDA team is conducting animal dosing studies, but the USDA team is using rats rather than swine. Dr. Brown has analyzed the rat "chow" that is going to be used for the feedings and has found the levels within the chow to be "good." The team has received funding for their feeding experiments and is having rats delivered on Tuesday. The USDA team plans to use four different soil treatments in their dosing studies:

Control treatment

1% phosphorus treatment

0.5% phosphorus treatment

Iron plus phosphorus treatment

The first three treatments are the same as those used in the University of Missouri's swine study. (Drs. Brown and Chaney thanked the University of Missouri [i.e., Dr. Blanchar and John Yang] for providing soils.) The fourth treatment differs from the University of Missouri's treatment in that it has a lower phosphorus content (0.32%) and a higher iron content (2.5%). The USDA team chose the treatments based on grass plant data and in vitro data.

In addition to animal dosing studies, the USDA team is hoping to conduct additional grass and soil sampling at Joplin. Ideally, sampling will occur in May and September, with the more extensive effort invested in September. Dr. Brown hopes to archive some of the samples from the September collection. The USDA team is talking about performing in vitro analyses and "total per plot" analyses with the new samples. Dr. Brown is unsure whether the latter will be necessary since she performed total per plot analyses on composite samples collected last September. At this time, due to limited funding, the team does not have plans to use the new samples for animal feedings.

Kansas State University's Activities

Gary Pierzynski and a Ph.D. graduate student have collected five soil samples from the Joplin site. To date, they have run total metals analyses on their samples. They have determined that the soils have about 2800 mg lead/kg soil, 2800 mg/kg at the time critical repository, and 1300 mg/kg at the active repository.

Dr. Pierzynski and the student are still trying to decide what analyses and tests they are going to conduct. At this point, they plan to investigate pH control and the acidification of samples, source of phosphorus, plant uptake, and bioaccessibilty. Working with mineralogists, they also plan to use x-ray defraction to quantify pyromorphite formations.

MISCELLANEOUS

Dr. Ryan told the group that he and Dr. Berti are thinking about working on the IINERT research document and turning it into a review article that could be published in Environmental Science and Technology. Dr. Ryan thinks releasing the document will stimulate others to fill in missing pieces and to inform the Action Team of potential sites. He asked the conference call participants whether they thought this would be a useful endeavor. They agreed that it is a worthwhile effort. One issue that Dr. Ryan thinks could be problematic is citation. While some of the information in the review article will be easily ìcitable,î a lot of the information will not. Dr. Ryan will cite what he can, but is not sure how to deal with the ìuncitableî material. Dr. Ryan asked whether participants thought it would be reasonable and ethical to simply acknowledge the Action Team and to list all of the people involved. The conference call participants had no objections to this approach.

UPCOMING CONFERENCE CALLS

Dates have been set for the next four conference calls:

April 20, 1998

May 18, 1998

June 15, 1998

July 20, 1998

The calls will take place between 2:00 and 3:00 eastern time. Dr. Berti asked the participants whether they wanted conference calls to occur more or less frequently than scheduled; participants agreed that a monthly schedule is the best option.