Integrated Subsurface Modeling and Risk Assessment of Petroleum-Contaminated Sites in Western Canada

Abstract

Soil and groundwater contamination can pose a variety of impacts and risks to communities. Identification of management schemes with sound environmental and socio-economic efficiencies is desired. Before any decisions regarding site remediation actions can be made, three major questions may have to be answered. They are namely “What happened underground?”, “What will happen in the future under the given remediation scenarios?”, and “Are there specific risks to the surrounding community?”. In this study, an integrated modeling and risk assessment method is developed for effectively managing petroleum-contaminated sites through technically answering the above questions. It presents an integral concept that integrates issues of multicontaminant transport simulation, biodegradation modeling, health risk assessment, and site remediation for real-world problems within a general decision support framework. The developed method is applied to a petroleum-contaminated groundwater system in western Canada for identifying cost-effective management schemes with improved environmental and socio-economic efficiencies. The research outputs are directly useful for the decision maker to gain insight into the site and to make remediation decisions.