REMEDIATION TECHNOLOGIES DEVELOPMENT FORUM
SEDIMENTS REMEDIATION ACTION TEAM

Progress Report
Fourth Quarter 2002

Introduction

The Sediments Remediation Action Team is one of the six active Action Teams under the Remediation Technologies Development Forum (RTDF). The Sediments Remediation Action Team includes representatives from industry, government, and academia who share an interest in developing alternatives for remediating contaminated sediments.

This report documents progress of the Sediments Remediation Action Team during the fourth quarter of 2002.

Accomplishments

  1. The Team held a meeting October 29-30 in Seattle, Washington. The agenda included a general session providing updates on Team activities and a ground-water-surface-water workshop. Team members are hoping to prepare a summary on the outcomes from the workshop that will be included with the meeting minutes.
  2. Team members are assisting the Anacostia Watershed Toxics Alliance (AWTA) in examining the comparative effectiveness of five capping methods at contaminated sediment sites along the river. The capping technologies are undergoing bench-scale testing and will be ready for in situ application in the spring of 2003. Two phases of site characterization will be conducted in fall 2002 and spring 2003 to establish a contamination baseline at the demonstration areas.
  3. The Natural Recovery Subgroup has refined its framework and developed a sediment monitored natural recovery (MNR) assessment template while identifying additional case history examples. Future plans include finalizing the MNR evaluation framework, completing the case history template that is now in draft form, documenting a representative set of case histories, developing framework and case study presentations and publications, and developing a Web site that will house the results of the Subgroup's efforts.
  4. The Sediment Decision Subgroup will continue to provide comments on the joint-agency guidance—to be promulgated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the U.S. Navy, and the RTDF—for evaluating and managing contaminated sediment sites. Individual document chapters are currently being compiled and edited.