Elements Volume 5

SITE INVESTIGATIONS

 

What Are You Looking For?

 

A site assessment at any level, whether for the risk determination or simply for general industrial what potentially hazardous substances exist on the site and at what levels. The investigator becomes a detective of sorts, gleaning as much credible information as possible from historical before deciding whether to physically sample the site and conduct analytical testing. In the words of Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes “My name is Sherlock Holmes. My business is to know what other people do not know.”

 

If results of your sleuthing indicate that you will indeed need to sample the site then do yourself a favour – stop and ask yourself “what am I looking for?” True, the site investigations and sampling investigations are so well-established that they

almost preclude original thought. However, there is a very strong argument to be made for the intelligent investigator who attempts the process. Asking “what am I looking for?” or perhaps more cautiously worded “what am I probably looking for?” is key to a successful sampling and testing plan. Certain industrial processes lend themselves to the production of

certain toxic substances. If you are an industrial chemist, knowing what to test for probably isn’t the sites’ industrial past. For the other 99.9% of the population however, this information isn’t always intuitive, and you probably didn’t cover it in Grade 12 Chemistry.

 

Where to start?

 

A good place to start is by trying to chemically industrial past. To assist with this, the Canadian Environmental Protection Act (EPA) is an excellent resource as it has always concerned itself with maintaining a list of Toxic Substances. These are

substances that have or may have an immediate or long-term harmful effect on the environment, humans, animals or on biological diversity in general. Not surprisingly, if something is found on the EPA’s Toxic Substance List, it is typically a compound of interest in other environmental regulations and guidelines that have been built around this information, so it is worth taking a close look at the list.

 

And for those without a PhD in industrial chemistry, the EPA listing also sheds light on the common sources associated with these compounds which means you don’t have to chase ghosts when selecting your testing regime and you can minimize the risk of undertesting as well. For example, a former plastic manufacturing site is likely to have residues that will be related to the type of plastic being manufactured. Investigations related to the raw materials as well as the type of process involved may yield a list of target analytes which may or may not be priority pollutants. A wood preservation treatment operation is likely to be affected by those chemicals in the process.

 

One site may have used a metals substrate and another a coal tar creosote-based material to treat the wood. Depending on the process used to investigate the site conditions.