A National Consorium of RABs

[Don Zweifel <zweifel@chapman.edu>]

Is there sufficient justification for a coalition of Restoration Advisory
Boards?

What's the issue here?

Doesn't it basically boil down to a quantitative factor? Specifically
whether a RAB has an adequacy of influence to promulgate its point of
view as appropriate, applicable and relevant to the adequacy of a
particular remediation alternative. Which should be premised upon the
successful implementation at other similar sites nationwide.

The question here is how are we to know which clean-up technology utilizes
the Best Available Technology (BAT) as well as what is most practicable 
(Best Practicable Technology) if we don't know what's been accomplished
effectively at other sites? The Best Conventional Technology (BCT) is most
often anachronism contemporarily speaking and probably should be relegated
to the dust bin of history, e.g., "tried and true pump n' treat."

Many innovative technologies have been investigated at great cost
throughout all EPA regions. A few have proven to be outstanding, as an
example, at Marine Corps Air Station, Tustin, Ca. an EE/CA or Engineering
Evaluation and Cost Analysis was right on the money regarding the
technology chosen to mitigate contaminates around and under numerous USTs
or Underground Storage Tanks. 

Your RPMs (Remedial Project Mgrs) are most likely not aware of every
remarkably efficient and cost-effective remediation effort. There are
reports on these super-efficient technologies on their desks, but alas,
with so much else for them to do it seldom gets the attention it deserves. 

Therefore, a national clearing house for the exchange of this vital
information needs to be actualized. Everyone will benefit except certain
contractors that would rather "study the thing to death" than be decisive
and stick their necks out a little, which also pertains to some Federal
Facilities Engineering Divisions. 

A case in point being El Toro Marine Corps Air Station, Ca. The Dept. of
the Navy (DON) spent over $60 million on studies and only a pittance on
clean-up. For years our RAB has beseeched the DON and EPA Region Nine to
implement innovative solutions to the serious soil and groundwater
contmination problems there and only in the last year has anyone actually
decided to get off the dime. 

On the other hand, MCAS, Tustin, Ca., which is only four miles distant, 
has spent almost 65% of its Remediation and Restoration budget on
clean-up... Desi Chandler, BEC (BRAC Environmental Coordinator) for the
station deserves a lion's share of the credit because she didn't
hesitate to utilize unconventional technology, e.g., thermal desorption
immediately comes to mind. Tens of thousands of cubic yards of soil were
processed recently involving BTEX and other god-awful chemicals. Desi
sought out solutions and decisively strove to implement them.

This BEC's highly successful track record is probably unknown to most of
you out there. However, Sol Bloom's proposed nationwide get-together will
begin the process of sharing these crucial data. Sol's trail-blazing
concept has been a front-burner issue to him for years. He never ceased in
his crusade as a member of CalEPA's Dept. of Toxic Substances Control
Advisory Group. 

 Please come to the DERTF meeting in Phoenix on 27 Jan. '98 and especially 
the National Caucus of RABs, which will be held sequentially, I believe.

For more info call Karen at ARC Ecology on her voice line @ 415+495-1786
in San Francisco, Ca.

 Don Zweifel
 Operable Unit #1 subcommittee chair,
 MCAS, El Toro, Ca.
 RAB member, MCAS, Tustin, Ca.
 Cons. to El Toro Local Redevelopment Authority
 and Citizen's Advisory Commission