Risk-Based Corrective Measures for Waste Management Facility Closure

Chang, Chi-Chung; ,

Risk-Based Corrective Measures for Waste Management Facility Closure

by Chi-Chung Chang,

Document Type: Proceeding Paper

Part of: WRPMD'99: Preparing for the 21st Century

Abstract:

(No paper) In the past several years, risked-based corrective measure has been gradually accepted by federal and state agencies as a standard practice for site remediation or site closure. The risk-based corrective measures include the steps that assess whether current (baseline) site conditions could pose environmental and human health risk concerns, and then evaluate the effectiveness of each proposed corrective measure to minimize or eliminate current or future environmental exposure to the constituents of concern associated with the site. Since most closure or remediation strictly by removal or decontamination is not feasible due to the high cost, applying the risked-based corrective measure would assist us to optimize our resource to manage our environments. This paper presents a technical risk-based approach and cost effectiveness analysis used to design closure systems for site closure. This paper also provides a discussion of the data collection and data evaluation conducted to support the closure risk assessment. Exposure pathways, human receptors, and fate and transport modeling used to evaluate exposure potential are included in this paper. The development of risk-based values (RBVs) that were used to estimate acceptable human health risk levels and to provide risk-based design specifications for the closure system are described. Case studies are presented to demonstrate that the risk-based corrective measures are cost-effective remedies that will achieve long-term control at acceptable levels of risk.

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