SUMMARY OF THE REMEDIATION TECHNOLOGIES DEVELOPMENT FORUM
PHYTOREMEDIATION ACTION TEAM
CHLORINATED SOLVENTS SUBGROUP
CONFERENCE CALL

October 11, 2001
1:00 p.m.-2:30 p.m.

On October 11, 2001, the following members of the Remediation Technologies Development Forum's Phytoremediation Action Team, Chlorinated Solvents Subgroup, met in a conference call:

Also present was Sarah Dun of Eastern Research Group, Inc.

INTRODUCTION

Several new Subgroup members participated in the conference call. Bob Tossell asked them to describe their backgrounds and discuss their interest in phytoremediation technologies. Tossell then summarized the Chlorinated Solvents Subgroup's progress to date. The Subgroup's main goal, he said, is to promote phytoremediation as a remedial tool for sites contaminated with chlorinated solvents. Toward this end, the Subgroup is creating documents that will help site owners, project managers, and consultants determine whether phytoremediation is appropriate to use at a given site, and if it is used, to evaluate the technology's performance. Two documents are being created. The first one--referred to as the short protocol--contains concise step-by-step information that explains how to perform phytoremediation field demonstration tests. The second document, which is longer, provides detailed background information, along with an explanation of the processes underlying chlorinated solvent degradation.

COMMENTS ON THE SUBGROUP'S SHORT PROTOCOL

Drafts of the short and long protocol have been generated and distributed to Subgroup members. Tossell asked call participants to focus their efforts solely on the short protocol during this conference call. Ideally, he said, this document will be released to a broader audience by the end of the year. Call participants brought up the following points:

• Modifications should be made to the laboratory testing section. Xiujin Qiu advised making the language under this section more flexible.



• A balance should be struck between flexible and prescriptive instructions. Fielder said that the TPH in Soil Subgroup has also written a protocol. She noted that this protocol is more prescriptive than the Chlorinated Solvents Subgroup's protocol, and asked call participants to comment on that fact. Tossell said that the Chlorinated Solvents Subgroup protocol should remain flexible, because, he hopes, it will be used across a wide variety of applications and sites. Qiu did not think it was possible to be prescriptive at this point. She advised adding references to the protocol so that potential users could determine whether their sites have commonalities with sites that are already using phytoremediation. A potential user who finds a match will contact seasoned site owners to obtain more prescriptive guidance.



• The Subgroup needs to think about what type of sites to target. Linda Fiedler said that the TPH in Soil Subgroup initiated phytoremediation studies at more than a dozen contaminated sites. The Subgroup is having trouble, however, discerning trends: the sites selected are complex and differ greatly from one another. She asked whether Chlorinated Solvents Subgroup members want to be more selective about which sites participate in their field program. Tossell said that he did not, indicating that he hopes to test the protocol across a variety of sites and applications.



• The monitoring costs associated with phytoremediation should be similar to or less than those incurred using other technologies. Tossell said that phytoremediation has not yet achieved a firm foothold. Therefore, when developing monitoring schemes, one must take care to keep costs down. Otherwise, potential users will bypass phytoremediation and defer to older, more established technologies.



• Text needs to be added to describe contaminant fate within plant tissue. Tossell said that he will contact Lee Newman to find out whether she will write this section. He also encouraged other Subgroup members to step forth and write the section if they are interested in this topic.

Tossell said that the protocol is about 50% complete. Information is still needed on implementation strategies. He asked Subgroup members to review the short protocol and to send comments to him (btossell@CH2M.com) by November 7, 2001. (Tossell said that the existing document is in Microsoft Word; he advised submitting comments electronically using the software's "edit mode.") Tossell asked the following members to pay close attention to specific sections:

Jordahl	Fertility and soil amendments
Hirsh and Compton	Plant monitoring
Compton	Air

Tossell said that he will gather the comments and use them to modify the existing text. A revised protocol will be distributed to Subgroup members on November 12 or 13, 2001. Subgroup members should be prepared to discuss this version during the next Subgroup conference call, which is scheduled for November 15, 2001.