PNNL

Environmental remediation of complex sites typically involves the implementation and operation of remedial actions over long time frames. The process of selecting and integrating effective remediation and treatment technologies based on site contaminants and characteristics is now further complicated by the need to integrate observed and predicted effects of climate change. In addition, vulnerability assessments of existing remedial actions should be conducted to assess their climate resiliency.

Join our panel of speakers in examining potential impacts of climate change on remediation design and execution, including case study examples and programmatic approaches to enhancing climate resiliency.

Our presentations include:

The Future Isn’t What It Used to Be: Implications of Climate Change in Contaminated Site Remediation. Presented by Eric Mielbrecht, EcoAdapt

Society should expect resilient and sustainable site remediation, but climate change is rapidly shifting the conditions in which remediation occurs and with greater extremes. Enduring remedies require creative and research-based adaptation of what have become standard approaches to managing the fate and effects of contaminants. We need to change the way we think about toxicity, acceptable risk, social and equity considerations, and long-term stewardship of contaminated sites for the safety of our communities and the environment.

Extrapolating National and Regional Climate Science to the Site-Specific Level. Presented by Rajiv Prasad, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

While the spatial resolution of global climate models is increasing, the complex nature of the models still results in significant computational costs. The U.S. Global Change Research Program synthesizes climate model predictions at regional scales covering the United States (the Fifth National Climate Assessment will use 10 regions). To provide useful information for remediation of contaminated sites, local and site-specific climate projections are necessary. This presentation will provide an overview of climate science research and related national and regional datasets, and how to extrapolate this information to the site scale.

Climate Resiliency Planning for Department of Energy Legacy Sites. Co-presented by Jason Nguyen, Department of Energy, Office of Legacy Management and Zexuan Xu, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

The Office of Legacy Management (LM) is tasked with long-term stewardship of legacy sites within DOE. The long-term nature of this mission illuminates the importance of understanding climatic shifts that might impact environmental remedies. To begin to assess this, LM has engaged Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL). The LBNL team developed an interactive framework to integrate state-of-the-art climate data science and critical institutional knowledge at the sites. Additionally, open-source python toolsets (pypi.org/climate-resilience) were created to automate climate model data downloading, processing, and analytics for screening climate resilience risks at the LM sites. In parallel, a comprehensive survey was designed to collect information from the sites, which identified and documented various site assets, climate-related concerns and past events. This framework enables the comprehensive climate vulnerability assessments to be consistent across all the LM sites over diverse climate/geographical regions as well as provides a more robust understanding of the magnitude and likelihood of climate impacts on critical assets.