Re: [CPEO-MEF] Military readiness

[uxogypfy@bellsouth.net]

Hi Peter!

As always, I enjoy listening to you...hope all is well with you.  Normally I
sit a while before responding but I feel I must reply promptly.  Thank you
for speaking about another side of 'new technology' that you are familiar
with which points out another 'road block' to 'new' technology.  I, too, am
a member of one of ITRC's groups (UXO).  Thank you for saying there are not
enough stakeholders involved.

I can only share what I experienced while a RAB member of Camp Bonneville's
BRAC regarding talking with the local politicians about 'newer technology'.
I had posed during a meeting that they 'look around the country' and see
which sites had 'proven results' and act upon that accordingly to the issues
surround CB.  I was told they would ONLY use technologies within the state
of WA which left me speechless and dumbfounded.  So I can 'concur' with your
assessment about the 'fear' of newer technologies.  On the other hand, there
are sites with 'proof' but I will let others with the expertise speak about
that.

As you talk about 'realistic' expectations, I feel that is what I am
attempting to do.  How many years has this land lived with chemical
contamination?  How many years have the military and politicians and
regulators known of the fallout of certain chemicals?  My 'patience' is
wearing thin with realistic expectations Peter.  Cluster illnesses are not
going away and as a mother of six and a grandmother of 4, with I'm sure many
more children to follow, I am more concerned with their health and safety
than some politician's fear (that is for a psychologist to deal with-not
community members).  To share a quote - no guts no glory!

Take Care.....
Stella
----- Original Message -----
From: <petestrauss1@attbi.com>
To: "cpeo-military" <cpeo-military@igc.topica.com>
Sent: Tuesday, April 08, 2003 7:13 PM
Subject: Re: [CPEO-MEF] Military readiness


> Louis and Stella:
>
> We have had our own private conversation about clean-up techniques.  I'd
> like to share some of my thoughts.
>
>  While I think that the concept of more efficient/less costly cleanup
> technology is one almost all of us who subscribe to CPEO can support, it
is
> much more difficult getting a new technology accepted by the regulators,
the
> PRPs and even the stakeholders. I do not think it is a fair representation
> to say that the environmental consulting industry is lining its pockets at
> the expense of efficiency or the taxpayers.  There are contractual
> relationships and oversight that could be improved, for certain, but to a
> large degree it is barriers to using new technology that need to be
overcome
> in order to see the efficiencies and cost savings you have alluded to.
> These barriers can be classified in a number of ways.  To put it simply,
> each state and federal regulator must be certain that the technology works
> as advertised (rightly so), and this is a long process; stakeholders are
> often reluctant to be the Guinea Pigs for a new technology (rightly so),
and
> the PRPs usually want to go with the tried and true method so that they
have
> some certainty about time and money.  Environmental consultants working
for
> either group are paid to protect their respective perspective.
>
> That said, there are plenty of people working to overcome these barriers.
> One that I work with is the Interstate Technology Regulatory Council
(ITRC).
> Although it has plenty of faults, it brings together a large group of
state
> regulators to transfer experience about innovative  technology from state
to
> state and from state to federal.  Industry, including the consulting
> industry is involved, although I cannot say to what degree.  Stakeholders
> are involved to offer their opinions and concerns about innovative
> technologies (there are not enough !).  There are many other technical
> groups that I suspect work on similar problems.  But all in all, these are
> difficult barriers to overcome and we should be realistic about our
> expectations.  Acceptance of most innovative technology, whether it be a
> computer or an environmental system, is usually a very long process.
>
> Peter Strauss
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <starcompany@erols.com>
> To: "cpeo-military" <cpeo-military@igc.topica.com>
> Sent: Tuesday, April 08, 2003 12:13 PM
> Subject: Re: [CPEO-MEF] Military readiness
>
>
> >
> >  I was 1/3 of the way through Stella's message on military readiness and
> > was saying to myself "Stella just has to read this".  About half way
> > through, I said to myself, this HAS to be something that Stella has
> > written.  Sure enough, there at the bottom was her name.
> >
> > Here, here!!!
> >
> > When we started our company with the concept of developing,
> > demonstrating, and deploying extremely cost-effective and
> > technically-successful (and appropriate) site remediation technologies,
> > we were operating under a mis-guided concept:  We actually "thought"
> > that the environmental industry and its clients (and legal staffs)
> > wanted to clean up sites cost-effectively
> >  in a relatively short period of time, and with greater technical
> > success than they were experiencing using traditional "care-taker"
> > approaches such as pump-and-treat technologies.  Boy were we wrong!!!!
> >
> > Despite over 15 years of successful remediation projects using
> > innovative and cost-effective technologies, the number one obstacle to
> > acceptance of our advanced remediation methods, in our experience, has
> > been the whole-sale reluctance of site managers and environmental
> > remediation consultants to decrease the amount of time that they have to
> > spend on projects and the income/revenue (to the consultant) associated
> > with these efforts.  I know  of one government facility, for example,
> > where we could clean up a major plume in probably 3 years.  The site
> > manager has declined to utilize our methods on the basis that we will
> > clean the site up too quickly.  I understand from others that his
> > intention is to "retire" on this site/project.  I know of
> > another job where a plume must be addressed which is under a large
> > building.  Despite clear demonstration that we could address this plume
> > with minimal impact(s) and in situ remediation technologies, the
> > consultant/ contractor has opted for the use of vertical wells and a
> > pump-and-treat system.
> >
> > When confronted with the obvious technical and economic inadequacy of
> > this approach, as well as the obvious negative impacts on the operation
> > of the facility, the consultant's response was "The last thing we want
> > to do is decrease the amount of time we have to spend at the site or the
> > amount of money our client pays us to clean it up!"
> >
> > And I know of many, many, many sites where hopelessly inadequate,
> > technically inept (if not fradulent) technologies have been deployed,
> > usually at high cost and with little success.  My favorite was one which
> > failed miserably to address site contamination.  When confronted with
> > the poor results, the consultant's response was "Well, I guess it didn't
> > take! We'll have to do it again."  Guess what, the client/site actually
> > paid the consultant the same amount of money to "do it again".  And,
> > guess what, it didn't work the second time either.
> >
> > Yes, the DOD, DOE, and/or anyone else who is trying to use the "war on
> > terrorism" as a cop-out for obeying environmental laws and regulations
> > and addressing soil and groundwater contamination at their site/facility
> > has a hidden" agenda:  reallocation of environmental budgets to fund
> > other actions/programs and elimination of a lot of environmental cleanup
> > headaches
> >   But, the greed and incompetence of many environmental consultants, the
> > willing complicity of many of the site environmental managers (for
> > personal reasons usually), and (in many cases) the technical
> > incompetency of both surely has not helped matters much.
> >
> > Louis B. Fournier, Ph.D.
> > STAR Environmental, Inc.
> > 10 Wilmington-West Chester Pike
> > Chadds Ford, PA 19317
> > Phone:  610-558-2121
> > Fax:  610-558-2112
> > E-Mail:  starcompany@erols.com
> >
> > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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> >
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> >
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> >
> >
> >
>
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> You can find archived listserve messages on the CPEO website at
>
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>
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please send a blank message with no subject to:
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