Containment

The city of Franklin, Tennessee has been given the greenlight to proceed with a $4 million refurbishment of its leaking potable water reservoir. The money will come from the US federal stimulus package and a state loan. While significant soil must be removed and the site regraded, the true site containment upgrade will be the addition of a geomembrane conservation liner. Learn more here.;

Inadequate infrastructure and chaotic urban development are being blamed for floods that have devastated Istanbul, Turkey’s largest city. Thirty years ago, Turkey's population was approximately 45 million. Today, more than 70 million people call Turkey home, and more than 70% of the population lives in urban areas. This breakneck growth and movement into cities like Istanbul has resulted in an infrastructure ill-prepared to properly support the nation's needs. Even moderate rainfall is thought to challenge Istanbul's system. Learn more here.;

The Welsh seaside town of Aberaeron has experienced significant erosion along and around its seawall defenses, in part because the defense system was out-of-date, and in part because the land behind it was so low. Regular overtopping required a constant repair process. But a new revetment scheme set on geotextile separation fabrics aims to defuse wave energy and prevent the land beneath from washing out. Learn more here.;

After 10 years of remediation work to the Pittsfield, Mass., section of the Housatonic River, targeting the PCB contamination caused by a General Electric plant, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) says the amount of contamination entering Connecticut in the river has been reduced by 50 percent. Read more in the Litchfield County Times. Learn more here.;

On 12 November 2009, Dr. Ian D. Peggs of I-CORP INTERNATIONAL, Inc., will present a full day workshop during which three of the primary topics of SKZ's 2nd International Conference on Geosynthetics Middle East will be discussed in greater detail. (SKZ's conference takes place 11-12 November 2009 in Dubai, where Dr. Peggs' course will be held.) This in-depth event, "HDPE Geomembrane Liner Performance: the Reality," will address liner leakage, allowable leakage, liner integrity surveys and methods, understanding failure, predicting failure and end of useful service life, and more. Download the PDF registration form for more details.

The Request for Proposal Database (RFPdb) was created to facilitate the submission and sharing of competitive bidding business opportunities between organizations and contracting firms/independent contractors. The RFP pool is extremely broad, including construction, tourism, public relations, web design, and much more. The goal of the RFPdb is to provide a public site for organizations to post their Requests for Proposals (RFP) to a centralized location. Registration is free but required. More than 50,000 users have registered to date. Learn more here.;

The International Erosion Control Association (IECA) has published its latest issue of IECA E-Update. This issue includes CETCO's distribution agreement with Tensar for the Triton Marine Mattress System, EPA veteran Steven Bubnick's retirement, new IECA staff members, great deals with EC 10 (Dallas, 16-20 February 2010), the IECA Photo Contest (Deadline: 31 December 2009), and more. Learn more here.;

The City of South Pittsburg has filed a lawsuit against engineering firm James C. Hailey & Company and W&O Construction Company, Inc. James C. Hailey & Company, of Nashville, is the City's engineer and W&O Construction Company, Inc., of Livingston, Tenn., was hired to build a new sewage treatment lagoon for the South Pittsburg Water and Sewer Company. Read more. Learn more here.;

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) officials will be returning to Perry County, Ala. on Wednesday, September 16, 2009 for a public forum at the Uniontown City Hall Auditorium to update residents about the current operation of removing coal ash from the Emory River near the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) Kingston removal site in Roane County, Tenn., and placing it into the Arrowhead Landfill in Perry County. Read more.

Environmentalists this week expressed fears that Venice would face an increased risk of flooding if plans to expand the Italian city’s port are allowed to go ahead. The city’s port authority wants to develop a huge facility for bulk carriers. Learn more here.;

The San Bernardino County Mid-Valley Sanitary Landfill expansion on 20 acres in the north end of Rialto remains a few years away as officials continue to study the extent of perchlorate contamination at the former Rialto Ammunition Back-Up Storage Point. Unlined silt ponds at the site are thought to have contributed to percholate migration into soils. Learn more here.;

United States Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada) is publicly decrying a plan for a California waste company to dispose of municipal solid waste from the San Francisco area in a Nevada landfill cell. Senator Reid has argued against the cross-border burial and cites seismic activity in the area as a chief reason for concern, even with modern lining and drainage systems. Learn more here.;

In British Columbia, Canada, officials in the District of Squamish are exploring ways to expand the town’s landfill capacity without taking up more land. Vertical expansion is hoped for. But expansion would also bring in garbage from Whistler, and regional landfills require lining systems. Learn more here.;

The Oklahoma Water Resources Board (OWRB) approved the state’s first Clean Water State Revolving Fund (CWSRF) “green” projects under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. For example, a $2 million streambank stabilization and erosion control project along the Illinois River and Eucha/Spavinaw Creek watersheds. Learn more here.;

Federal agencies today released the seven draft reports required by President Obama's executive order on the Chesapeake Bay, which contain a range of proposed strategies for accelerating cleanup of the nation's largest estuary and its vast watershed. The draft reports are the first step in the creation of a new strategy for restoring and protecting the Chesapeake Bay and waterways in the region, as defined by the executive order. The reports include a variety of strategies and options for addressing issues such as water quality, public access, landscape conservation, climate change, scientific monitoring and the protection of living resources.

Teck Alaska, Inc., owner and operator of the Red Dog lead and zinc mine near Kotzebue, Alaska, has agreed to pay a $120,000 civil penalty issued by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for alleged Clean Water Act violations. The settlement includes a Consent Agreement and Final Order (CAFO) signed by Teck Alaska, Inc., which resolves National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit violations and unpermitted discharges at the Company's mine and port sites.

Work to evaluate contaminated sediments at the former Gasco and Siltronic sites on Portland Harbor will move ahead faster, thanks to a legal agreement between NW Natural, Siltronic and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Today's agreement, which outlines site specific engineering and design needed for cleaning up contaminated Willamette River sediment, will allow work to proceed quickly once the Record of Decision for the entire Portland Harbor Superfund site is issued.

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said today that cleanup of arsenic-contaminated soil at nearly 500 South Minneapolis homes is under way. This project is supported by $20 million in funding through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. Residents pay nothing for the cleanup.

In a move that stands to create jobs, boost local economies, improve aging water infrastructure and protect human health and the environment for people in the State of Wisconsin, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has awarded $105,948,300 million to the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources. This new infusion of money provided by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 will help the state and local governments finance many of the overdue improvements to wastewater projects that are essential to protecting public health and the environment across the state.

The Canadian Institute of Environmental Law and Policy (CIELAP) Board of Directors has introduced Thomas Esakin as CIELAP's new Executive Director. Most recently Tom worked as a Profesor Asignatura at the Universidad del Caribe, the public university in Cancun, México, where he was cross-appointed to the university's Sustainable Tourism Department and English Departments. During his career Tom has also been the Executive Director and Director of Development for JUMP Math; Inaugural Executive Director for the Clayoquot Biosphere Trust - the administrative arm for the Clayoquot Sound UNESCO Biosphere Reserve; and a senior aide and policy advisor on Parliament Hill.

SKZ's 2nd International Conference on Geosynthetics Middle East will be held in Dubai, UAE, 10-11 November 2009. The speaker and topic line up is certainly an impressive list. Ian Peggs of I-CORP will present on predicting end-of-life for high-density polyethylene (HDPE) geomembranes and the incorporation of flexible solar cells on exposed landfill caps; Carl De Leon of Solmax will present on geomembrane liners in harsh, petrochemical containment operations; Detlef Schramm of Dow will present a geomembrane global review; Silke Schwöbken of SENSOR will present on drainage detection systems; and much more. Dr. Helmut Zanzinger will chair the seminar. Download the program in PDF.

Combining the efforts of two industry leaders in remediation technologies promises to provide increased value to the environmental remediation industry. CETCO Remediation Technologies proudly announces a signed agreement with Tensar International Corporation (TIC) granting exclusive distribution rights to the Triton® Marine Mattress System in the United States and Canada for subaqueous treatment of contaminated sediments. Read more in the release.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is making information publicly available from electric utilities on the management of coal combustion residuals contained in surface impoundments and similar management units. Following the coal ash spill at a Tennessee Valley Authority facility in Kingston, Tenn., EPA requested the information from electric utilities to inform an assessment of the structural integrity of the surface impoundments. The responses from electric utilities cover 584 units from 219 facilities.

Newly published literature shows how the Tensartech Geocell Mattress Foundation Reinforcement System creates a 1m deep stiff foundation platform over poor ground and mitigates the effects of differential settlements, reduces lateral spread of foundation soils and can also increase their bearing capacity to improve stability enabling accelerated fill placement and project completion. Read more about this innovative system in the press release.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is seeking public comment on a new strategy that would make cleanups at hazardous waste sites greener. The Superfund Green Remediation Strategy is an initial effort to outline key actions and related activities that can be undertaken to promote green remediation and to reduce energy use. EPA is taking comment on action items that fall into three major categories: policy and guidance development, resource development and program implementation, and program evaluation.