Triad (environmental science)

The Triad [1] is an approach by the United States Environmental Protection Agency to decision-making for hazardous-waste site cleanup.[2] During the late 1990s, technology advocates from the environmental sector in the United States developed the approach by combining innovations in management and technology with ideas from hazardous-waste site cleanup experience.

Their goal was to form a framework for real-time environmental sensors and tools, to improve decision-making at contaminated sites. This resulted in a more formalized set of ideas in 2001 that soon became known as the Triad approach. The ideas spawned a Community of Practice by 2005.

The Triad Community of Practice[3] includes representatives of federal, state, and private sector organizations in the U.S. and abroad. By 2008, a European CoP had been formed [4] In 2008, a technical conference led largely by the CoP and covering the Triad Approach was held at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst, "Triad Investigations: New Approaches and Innovative Strategies.[5]"

The term Triad represents three elements: systematic project planning (SPP), dynamic work strategies, and innovative rapid sampling and analytical technologies. While elements of the Triad have long been used for site cleanup, Triad packages these best management practices together with the guiding principles:

  1. Use a planning process, which includes participation of all stakeholders (including a multidisciplinary project team, federal and state regulators, legal counsel, community members, and other environmental professionals), to determine the types of data required and to evaluate whether the site could benefit from real-time measurement technologies.
  2. Discussion of uncertainty management, data representativeness, and site closure strategies.
  3. Use of a site model that recognizes site characterization is an element used at all stages of remediation.
  4. Use of sampling, measurement, and data management technologies to support uncertainty management strategies.
  5. Project teams that have communication, trust, discussion of individual interests and goals, and expertise in the appropriate fields.

Triad is an open-marketplace idea that is not owned by one entity. There is considerable U.S. Multiagency support for Triad.[6] Beginning in 2006, The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Office of Superfund Remediation and Technology Innovation expressed support of Triad by requesting the cooperation of its regional managers to expand the use of Triad at Superfund sites, where appropriate.[7]

  1. ^ Triad Resource Center
  2. ^ pp.91-111, Crumbling, Griffith, Powell
  3. ^ "Triad Resource Center | Triad User Experiences".
  4. ^ European CoP Info
  5. ^ 2008 Triad Conference Archived 2011-03-14 at the Wayback Machine
  6. ^ "Triad Resource Center | Multiagency Support for Triad".
  7. ^ http://www.triadcentral.org/ref/ref/documents/Triad_Policy_Memo.pdf EPA Memo OSWER-9200.1-55