Subject: Consultants List, Statistical Groundwater Monitoring
To Whom It May Concern:
The West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection,
Division of Waste Management (DWM) is emphasizing its enforcement of
Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) requirements for the
statistical monitoring of groundwater at solid waste landfills,
hazardous waste landfills, and hazardous waste cleanup sites. To
assist owners and operators, the DWM will maintain a list of
consultants interested in performing this type of work. To be listed
as a statistical consultant, just follow the directions below. Please
pass this announcement along to colleagues who may be interested.
Groundwater monitoring data comprise messy multivariate time
series. There are four to ten monitoring wells at most landfills, and
at many landfills there are few samples from each well. Sixty-six
parameters, mostly chemical concentrations, are monitored. Most
distributions are normal or lognormal. Left-censoring is common, and
some outliers occur. Trends are present in some wells, but other
autocorrelation usually is not. Regulations require detecting
contamination by comparing wells to a well known to be uncontaminated,
or by demonstrating that no increase in any measured parameter has
occurred within any well.
Preparing groundwater monitoring reports requires the expertise
of a hydrologist and a statistician, and advice from an engineer might
be helpful. Collaborative efforts among consultants are encouraged.
The role of the statistician probably will be to set up procedures for
the statistical analyses and prepare the first report, and then to
oversee preparation of future reports. Statistical analyses do not
have to be conducted by or sealed by an engineer, geologist, or other
professional. All reports and data submitted under the groundwater
monitoring program are in the public domain, and consequently, are
available for use in research.
The DWM regulates 19 active solid waste landfills, two active
hazardous waste landfills, and 31 hazardous waste cleanup sites.
Owners and operators of these facilities will make their own
arrangements for consulting help.
Additionally, the DWM hires two contractors for statistical
groundwater monitoring at 29 closed solid waste landfills. When the
current contracts expire, bid requests will be advertised and sent to
consultants on the DWM statistical consultants list, among others.
Groundwater monitoring requirements are summarized in the EPA
Call Center's very readable RCRA Training Modules found at:
http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/hotline/rmods.htm
Statistical Methods for Detection and Quantification of
Environmental Contamination (Robert D. Gibbons and David E. Coleman,
2001, John Wiley & Sons, New York, 384 p., ISBN 0-471-25532-7) is a
comprehensive review of this topic by two statisticians.
The most recent U.S. EPA manual is Statistical Analysis of
Ground-Water Monitoring Data at RCRA Facilities, Addendum to Interim
Final Guidance, July 1992. It is available at:
http://www.epa.gov/correctiveaction/resource/guidance/sitechar/gwstats/gwstats.htm
Regulations for statistical groundwater monitoring at hazardous
and non-hazardous solid waste landfills and hazardous waste cleanup
sites are essentially identical. Regulations for non-hazardous
landfills are found in the West Virginia Code of State Rules, Title
33, Series 1, Section 4.11, which is available at the following web
page:
http://www.wvsos.com/csr/verify.asp?TitleSeries=33-01
Regulations for hazardous waste landfills and cleanup sites are
found in Title 40 of the Code of Federal Regulations, Part 264,
Subpart F, Sections 90 through 101 (40 CFR 264.90-101), and 40 CFR
265.90-94. These are available at:
http://www.epa.gov/docs/epacfr40/chapt-I.info/subch-I.htm
The American Society for Testing Materials (ASTM) Standard D6312-98,
"Standard Guide for Developing Appropriate Statistical Approaches for
Ground-Water Detection Monitoring Programs" is applicable to this
problem. It is available from:
http://www.astm.org
The DWM has not made a final decision on precisely which
statistical methods will be acceptable. However, it is likely that
the methods of ASTM Standard D6312-98, and Gibbons and Coleman (2001)
will be adopted.
If you or your firm would like to be included in the list of
statistical consultants, please submit a one-page, text-only summary
of your qualifications and experience, emphasizing your statistical
qualifications. Include in that page, the name, address, telephone
number, and e-mail address for one contact person and the URL of your
web site (as text, not as a link or an HTML tag), if you have one.
Use 12 point type with one-inch margins, and submit the summary in the
.rtf file format. At the top of the page, give your or your company
name as a headline in 14 pt. type. Submit by e-mail to:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
(SpamMotel is a spam-killing e-mail forwarding service. It's free;
check it out!)
Please contact me with any questions you may have.
If you do not receive a reply to an e-mail sent to the SpamMotel
address, visit the web page of the State of West Virginia-->Dept. of
Environmental Protection-->Division of Waste Management-->Solid Waste
Permitting.
B.R.
WVDEP
251026473393872
Posted at sci.stat.edu, sci.stat.math,
alt.sci.math.statistics.prediction, misc.industry.quality,
sci.geo.geology, sci.geo.hydrology, sci.engr.civil,
sci.environment.waste, alt.wastewater
.
.
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