Principal Allison Geiselbrecht, PhD, recently attended Battelle’s 2023 International Conference on the Remediation and Management of Contaminated Sediments in Austin, Texas. Dr. Geiselbrecht presented on the Large-Scale MNR and Enhanced MNR Remedy in Western Port Angeles Harbor. The talk, authored by staff from Floyd|Snider, Anchor QEA, Exponent, and Integral Consulting, described the key tools used to inform a remedy decision at the Western Port Angeles Harbor Site, as well as the selection process for the cleanup remedy. This large-scale remedy required early collection of multiple lines of evidence and a collaborative approach with regulators on data quality objectives and data interpretation.

Dr. Geiselbrecht also presented her poster on Determining Representative Sediment Background Concentrations: Overview of ASTM Guidance. This poster provided an overview of new ASTM guidance documents developed to provide important and relevant guidance for the community—both regulated and regulator—applicable to state and federal cleanup sites, with the goal of generating robust and scientifically defensible representative background concentrations for sediment cleanup sites.

In addition to the above presentations, Dr. Geiselbrecht co-taught an ASTM short course at the conference on Developing Representative Sediment Background Concentrations. This course overviews the key ASTM guidance documents and provides case study walk-throughs to illustrate application of the guidance. Key ASTM guidance documents, can be found here: https://www.astm.org/e3242-20.html and here https://www.astm.org/e3344-22.html. Finally, Dr. Geiselbrecht co-chaired a session on Determining Background.