Overview of the Triad Approach: Is Triad Really Something New

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Overview of the Triad Approach Is Triad Really
Something New? (Handouts Version)

Deana M. Crumbling, M.S. Office of Superfund
Remediation and Technology Innovation U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency, Washington,
D.C. [phone] crumbling.deana_at_epa.gov SAME
Meeting, Boston June 27, 2006
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Successful Strategies Condense ? Central Theme
(what) 3 Elements (how) A holistic
approach to site cleanup and reuse
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Managing Decision Uncertainty

• Get the right answers to achieve end-goals, with
  sufficient confidence to
• Meet regulatory concerns
• Perform cost-benefit estimations
• Support site reuse
• Developer valuation
• Insurance underwriting
• Lending
• Community buy-in

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Does the Triad approach introduce any brand new
ideas that no one has ever thought of before?
Is Triad New?It depends on how the question
is asked
No Triad Draws on Prior Efforts Successes
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Does Triad represent a radically new way to
manage cleanup projects that is different from
what is commonly and routinely done?
Yes Every new team undertaking a Triad project
acknowledges how different Triad is from what
they are used to doing
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What Makes Triad Successful?

• Triad takes all successful pieces integrates
  them into a coherent package that restructures
  how cleanup projects are planned implemented.
• Triad shifts resource investmentbut saves 33 -
  50 of overall (lifecycle) project time costs,
  as compared to conventional (may or may not save
  on analytics of characterization phase)
• See summaries of 7 projects in the July 2004
  Technology News and Trends newsletter at
  http//www.triadcentral.org/ref/room/index.cfm

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Examples of Actual Project Savings
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The purpose of the Triad approach is to bridge
the disconnect between
what is routinely done(based on 1980s
knowledge technology) what is now
possible (as synthesized from experienced
practitioners opportunities from technology
advances)
2nd-Generation Practices
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The 3 Namesake Components

• Dynamic work strategies (DWSs) allow field work
  to adapt in real-time based on consensus-approved
  decision trees.
• Able to understand contaminant distributions
  switch gears when site conditions are not as
  expected smarter
• Reduce of work plan revision cycles
  mobilizations to the field faster, more
  resource-efficient less costly
• Builds staff expertise (quickly close learning
  feedback loops)
• Triad systematic project planning is MUCH more
  difficult, comprehensive time-intensive than
  conventional (see later slides) in order to
  develop successful DWSs
• Real-time measurements includes all data
  generation data use technologies that support
  the adaptive field strategy pre-test
  technologies procedures if in doubt about
  successful deployment.

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IMPORTANT !! Triad is NOT the same thing as
expedited, accelerated, or streamlined site
characterization! (although many of the same
concepts are part of Triad)
Triad is NOT just for site characterization!
Triad is also used to guide remedial design
implementation long-term monitoring to
increase efficiency cost-effectiveness
Triad systematic planning is broader, more
intensive than DQO-based (goals for data quality)
systematic planning
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Key Aspects of Triad Project Planning

• Proactively build social capitaluse facilitation
  if needed to gain trust openness among
  stakeholders build consensus on project/site
  end-goals
• Project team develops regulator-approved decision
  trees to guide DWS field implementation
• Triad expects contamination to be heterogeneous
  the CSM includes characterization of
  sample-related variability.
• The CSM is the hypothesis being tested refined.

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Key Aspects of Triad Planning (cont.)

• Manage sample support representativeness so
  data results can be confidently extrapolated to
  decision unit
• Demonstrations of method applicability (DMAs)
  pre-testing to ensure sampling tools sample
  processing, field fixed lab analytics will
  work in the field
• Collaborative data sets blend analytical
  techniques so limitations of each managed by
  strengths of the other

These are not brand-new concepts! BUT integrating
them ALL into project design regulatory
oversight IS new!
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Triad is NOT

• written in all caps (not an acronym!)
• just about using field analytical! (Warning
  Just using field analysis does not mean they used
  Triad !!)
• a way to justify using field analysis without
  using proper QC (MUST have data of
  known/documented quality!)
• just about using a dynamic/flexible work plan
  (must actively manage decision uncertainty!)
• taking 10 zillion samples (use your head your
  CSM to increase high-value samples that manage
  uncertainty!)
• a license to write vague work plans or escape
  regulatory oversight or accountability.

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Triad is an internally consistent process for
planning implementing projects, based on
managing all causes of decision uncertainty
(technical non-technical)
Summary
EPA slowly adopting Triad as a platform for
modernizing the overall site cleanup paradigm
across the public private-sectors
Dont oversell field tools or Triad Requires
non-traditional up-front investment highly
skilled expertise
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Triad Resource Center http//www.triadcentral.or
g

• Triad Resource Center website is THE repository
  for Triad-related material, including
• Explanations of Triad concepts
• Detailed project case studies cost savings
  estimates (where available)
• Project summaries (Project Profiles)
• Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
• Glossary of Triad terminology
• Articles and publications

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Triad is proven to increase stakeholder
satisfaction save time money!! BUTIt is a
great challenge to change the thinking habits
of a community as interlinked, yet diverse, as
the environmental cleanup community

• "The difficulty lies, not in the new ideas,
• but in escaping the old ones..."
• John Maynard Keynes
• (English economist,
  1883-1946)