Foam Over Troubled Toxics
Foams are now being used to control noxious vapor emissions from hazardous waste landfills. Another use of foams is in control of vapors emitted by chemical spills and fires. This article...
Rolling Incinerators
The Illinois Environmental Protection Agency (IEPA) is using a mobile incinerator to clean up a former oil and solvent storage/transfer operation which was badly contaminated. The benefits...
Take Back the Land
Municipal sludge applied to land devastated by strip mining has brought thousands of acres of Ohio, Illinois and Pennsylvania land back to life. After two years of testing at a Palmerton,...
EPA: Siting Permanent Solutions
EPA's SITE (Superfund Innovative Technology Evaluation) program is entering its third year. It is designed to speed up hazardous waste treatment technology. The program helps...
Speaking of RISK
With sensitivity, common sense and preparation, an engineer can explain risk effectively and fairly without alienating the public. Risk communicators should use a standard set of terms...
Pinpointing Nonpoint Pollution
The Tennessee Valley Authority is using aerial photography to locate nonpoint sources of water pollution. These cause most of the water quality problems in the region. Failing septic tanks...
Biological Treatment of Hazardous Wastes
Biological treatment�using nature's bacteria and fungi�sometimes costs as little as 10-20% as incineration. Wastes in any form�solid, aqueous and gaseous�can be treated biologically....
Managing Mixed Waste
The category of mixed waste is an ambiguous one that is not clearly defined nor assigned to any one federal agency. These wastes, according to definitions in several government documents,...
Lead: Taking it from the Tap
Medical evidence is lowering the definition of a safe concentration of lead. In turn, there has been an effort to reduce lead in drinking water. Solutions are complicated, as many lead...
A Study in Nuclear Decommissioning
The Gentilly-1 nuclear power plant two year decommissioning project launched a series of firsts for the nuclear power industry. It was the first commercial sized plant in the world to...
Future Shock for Farmers
An expert panel of water and agricultural practices specialists met and predicted how the nation should and might deal with problems associated with nonpoint pollution sources, especially...
Swiss Cheese Box Girders
Now going up in the French Alps, the Sylans and Glacieres viaducts have decks supported by three-dimensional arrays of concrete trusses. The superstructures look like concrete box girders...
Steel Pipe Foundations for Deep Water
Four innovations are helping to make steel pipe piles more popular for foundations in deep water in Southeast Asia. Until recently steel was usually rejected for these applications, because...
Drawing up Waterproof Curtains
Curtain wall damage has recently become the number one source of building owner complaints. Until wall systems are designed with backup water collection systems and other details, leakage...
Skytrain Crosses the River
The cable stayed bridge that will carry Vancouver's light rail line across the Fraser River is the world's longest such bridge built solely for mass transit....
Injecting an Oxygen Fix
Seasonal dissolved oxygen deficiencies are an old problem in hydropower discharges from deep impoundments. At the Richard B. Russell Dam near Savannah, Georgia, an innovative solution...
The `Down' of Top Down
The 800-space parking area for the Milwaukee Center was built in a four story deep basement of the building. In order to excavate the area without damaging two adjacent historic structures,...
High Strength High Rise
For the sixth time in history, a structure billed as the world's tallest concrete building (over 950 ft) is under construction in Chicago. The contractors describe the structure...
Building the Seven Seas
The Brookfield Zoo's Seven Seas Complex, outside of Chicago, is a combination of the Caribbean and the Pacific Northwest. Completed in May 1987, the Seven Seas Complex consists...
Dilatometers Settle In
The benefits of the dilatometer test DMT are described. This geotechnical in situ testing tool was developed and patented by an Italian professor and engineer named Silvano Marchetti....
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