Abstract: Sound Geoscience and Environmental Consulting Are Compatible!

CRAMER, RICHARD S., Groundworks Environmental, Inc., Santa Clara, CA

Engineering solutions alone do not result in the most costeffective solutions to environmental problems. The growth of the environmental consulting industry in the 1 980s was fueled by government regulations. In response, existing engineering firms expanded into the environmental consulting industry and approached environmental projects from a engineering point of view with limited input from the geosciences. This is illustrated by (1) the use of the Unified Soil Classification System (based on soil engineering properties) as the preferred means for describing the subsurface, and (2) using oversimplified descriptions of the highly complex subsurface to accommodate the limitations of numerical hydrogeologic models. Recently, environmental projects are being directed toward more health and resource risk-based solutions with less emphasis on costly engineering-driven cleanups. This change in direction provides opportunity to incorporate sound geoscience into environmental investigations; there is now more emphasis on accurately defining the distribution of contaminants in the subsurface, the migration pathway to potential receptors, and the hydrogeologic and hydrochemical controls on contaminant fate and transport.

As represented in the presentations of this theme session, the Unified Soil Classification System is giving way to more geologicbased analysis of the subsurface; the highly complex subsurface is more effectively characterized through sequence stratigraphic and hydrostratigraphic analysis. These presentations are examples of more scientifically sound and cost-effective approaches to solving environmental problems.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90935©1998 AAPG Pacific Section Meeting, Ventura, California