InSites is a quarterly newsletter that highlights the personalities and projects of the Waste Management Research and Education Institute (WMREI) of The University of Tennessee. WMREI is an affiliate of the EERC.
WMREI was created in 1985 as a state-funded Center of Excellence. Research areas include solid-, hazardous-, and nuclear-waste management; waste minimization; and pollution prevention.
Biotechnology is the focal point of the institute's technical research, while issues
involving public attitudes and federal/state policies related to waste-management issues
are the primary concerns of the institute's policy research.
For additional information about InSites, or to be added to our mailing list, please write InSites, WMREI, The University of Tennessee, 311 Conference Building, Knoxville, TN 37996-4134, call 865-974-1156, or fax 865-974-1838. Or, if you prefer, e-mail Constance Griffith
cbgriffith@utk.edu.
Advisors Assess Institute's Work by Intern Keeps His Finger on Pulse of Native China, by Making a Difference, Gaining a Skill,by Blazing New Trails, by An Eye on the Sky, by New Cleanup Strategy: Let Nature Heal Itself, by Video Explores Garbage Crisis in the Rural South
While no "letter" grade was given for the institute's efforts during the Waste Management Research and Education Institute's (WMREI) annual advisory committee meeting last fall, the committee's assessment can be summed up in a few words: You're doing just fine; keep it up, but seek improvement in several areas.
The committee praised the institute's interdisciplinary work, its efforts at citizen education, and its desire to be at the cutting edge of the nation's waste-related research agenda. And it cited the institute's efforts in biotechnology, low-level nuclear waste management, waste-facility siting, clean-product development, and waste reduction.
To advance its initiatives, the committee recommended the institute strengthen its expertise in risk analysis and assessment, connect its technical research more closely to field demonstrations, and create an industrial associates program to draw the private sector closer to the institute's work.
"WMREI has been recognized as a national research leader in waste-management issues since the late 1980s," says advisory committee chairman Frank Parker of Vanderbilt University. "The institute is now building on its strengths to move into new areas, such as pollution prevention, bioremediation, citizen participation in the siting of waste facilities, and lands management.
"It's an ambitious agenda," Parker says, "but the institute has a core staff ready to meet the challenge. And with its regional ties to Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the Tennessee Valley Authority, and an expanding national network, there is good reason to believe that WMREI's stature will grow over the next few years."
The 17-member advisory committee consists of a cross-section of experts in the waste-management field. About half are technical experts and about half are skilled in policy issues.
This year's new members include Abdul S. Abdul from General Motor's research and environmental staff in Warren, Michigan; Mona Doyle of the Consumer Network in Philadelphia; Burt Ensley from Environgen in Lawrenceville, New Jersey; and Thomas Nessmith from the Environmental Protection Agency's regional office in Atlanta.
"The waste-management problems facing the nation have both technical and policy aspects associated with them," says advisory committee member David Conn. "WMREI's efforts to address waste-management issues on both fronts are to be commended. It's risky business, but so far their investments seem to be paying off."
As for next year, WMREI's base budget from the state remains the same--approximately $700,000, which will be divided about evenly between the technical and policy groups. For this investment, WMREI will generate about $5-$6 million in outside funds.
The technical group, under Gary Sayler's direction, will continue to emphasize biotechnological solutions to the control of hazardous wastes. In addition, it will continue to serve as a training center for young scientists and engineers who seek to put the knowledge they learn in the classroom to practical use in the field.
For example, Paul Bienkowski will examine biotechnology-based, in-situ, strategies to decontaminate soils polluted with diesel oil. Chris Cox will chart the pace of biodegradation on a site artificially contaminated with fluorine and anthracene. And Larry McKay will examine the migration of contaminants through fractured clay and rocks.
The policy group, under the direction of Jack Barkenbus, will focus on broadening citizen participation in waste-management decision making, assessing environmental literacy, developing clean products, and determining whether there is sufficient capacity for treatment and disposal of hazardous waste.
For example, Gary Davis will lead an effort to study the feasibility of "take back" legislation that would require manufacturers to accept the products they produce once they have outlived their usefulness. Rosalyn McKeown-Ice will seek to establish a framework for assessing environmental literacy. And William Judge and Alex Miller will analyze how managers have responded to environmental issues as part of their overall corporate strategies.
"These projects promise to strengthen WMREI's core activities while allowing researchers to keep pace with the rapid changes in the fields of waste management and environmental policy," says Parker. "The advisory committee believes the projects represent a good mix of activities that will lead to a successful year of research and field work."
For a complete list of WMREI's 1994 research activities, contact Gail Farris, WMREI, 311 Conference Building, Knoxville, TN 37996-4134 or call (312) 974-4251.
by Worth Wilkerson
While studying for a doctorate in economics at the University of Tennessee, Zhongmin Shen has kept his finger on the pulse of his native China, thanks to an internship from the Waste Management Research and Education Institute (WMREI) that has taken him back to China four times in the last three years.
Each time, he was a member of a team from WMREI and Oak Ridge National Laboratory that was working on energy-related projects sponsored by the Rockefeller Foundation.
In addition to taking an active part in the economic studies associated with the projects, Shen served other team members as interpreter, not only of the language but of the customs and culture of the people as well.
"He was able to translate not only what the people said, but what they really meant, which many times is not the same thing at all," comments Milton Russell, director of the Joint Institute for Energy and Environment and senior fellow at WMREI. This paid off for the study team in the Yunnan province, where members were assessing the feasibility of eucalyptus plantations as a fuel source for electric generating plants. The project required extensive interviews with local officials and detailed negotiations with researchers and government officials--tasks right up Shen's alley.
Another project that tapped Shen's talents took place in the island province of Hainan. The project involved integrated resource planning for the entire province, with special emphasis on demand-side management to cut energy use on the energy-short island.
"Shen was a full partner in these projects," Russell emphasizes. "He functioned as an economist first, developing and analyzing data and writing reports. The fact that he could interpret the language and culture was a bonus."
"He made an enormous contribution, both on the intellectual and operational levels," Russell adds.
For Shen's part, he says his internships provided a "very, very valuable experience."
"I was able to contribute to the teams, particularly because of my language skills and, at the same time, I learned a great deal from the experience that I can apply to the real situation back home."
Before coming to UT from Beijing in 1988, Shen had studied English extensively and is so proficient that his accent is barely noticeable.
This year, Shen is working on his dissertation under a WMREI fellowship. He is again turning his attention to China. In his dissertation, he plans to explore and analyze the system of emission fees that has been used in China for the past 10 years or so-that is, if he can figure out the confusing data. "They have volumes of data, but none of it makes much sense," he says with a look of frustration.
While Shen has been busy with his studies in Knoxville, his wife, Qing, also has been hitting the academic trail. She has been working on her master's degree in computer science from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. During her course work, she and Shen were able to break away for only an occasional weekend together. But she has completed her thesis and is now home in Knoxville.
Shen keeps abreast of the evolving economic and political situation in China, a situation in which he finds both hope and disappointment. He and Qing hope to return to China and apply their new knowledge to helping build their native country.
by Linda Moist
Sheila Jones, a second-year graduate student, is a different kind of toxicologist. While most toxicology majors plan to do lab research, she's aiming for a career in policy research. A self-described "people-person," Jones is, in fact, the first toxicology graduate assistant at the Waste Management Research and Education Institute (WMREI) to work in policy research.
Although a great need exists for environmental policy makers with backgrounds in chemical toxicity, few opportunities exist for such students to get real work experience in policy issues. WMREI is providing that kind of opportunity for Jones through a research assistantship.
Under the direction of the Center for Clean Products and Clean Technologies' director, Gary Davis, she is developing a ranking scheme for assessing the hazards posed by various pollutants, such as formaldehyde and lead.
"We're delighted to have graduate students like Sheila work on our projects," comments Davis. "Besides making valuable contributions, they bring an enthusiasm and eagerness that keeps our work fresh."
Jones is one of 47 graduate students currently employed as interns or research assistants by the University of Tennessee's Energy, Environment, and Resources Center (EERC). Their focus is largely on waste remediation, but their tasks are varied. For example, geography major Lisa Owen is researching the complex social and economic issues that affect residents and business people living and operating near Department of Energy hazardous-waste sites that are now being cleaned up.
John Altman, another research assistant, is analyzing the impact of energy conservation groups on public service commissions and utilities in promoting demand-side management and other conservation strategies.
"The experience I've gained working on a big research project has been invaluable," Altman says. "Just as importantly, the project has allowed me to examine a critical policy issue that is of interest both to utility officials and government regulators."
According to Don Reed, director of EERC's business office, the number of graduate students the center employs has increased in recent years for two reasons.
"First," Reed says, "current students have found the work experience to be valuable. Word then gets around to incoming students who are eager to apply for openings in other projects. Second, WMREI and its affiliate organizations have made a concerted effort to engage more graduate students in their projects."
"Part of EERC's overall mission is to involve students," adds Mary English, an associate director at EERC who heads graduate fellowship programs.
"Graduate research assistants are good at seeking information, developing it, and assimilating it into the project," she says. "While the students gain valuable experience, the center gains tangible benefits from the contributions graduate research assistants make."
In the short term, the money students earn on these projects helps them finance their education. But the hands-on experience may prove even more valuable in the long term, especially in an economy marked by a tight job market.
"I've learned more about environmental policy working here at the center than I could have ever learned in the classroom," Jones says.
"In addition, I've made important professional contacts and learned to identify 'real' problems, as opposed to trendy ones. I'm confident," Jones says, "that this experience will serve me well when I enter the world of work after graduation."
For more information on EERC's student assistantship programs, contact Gail Farris, The University of Tennessee, WMREI, 311 Conference Building , Knoxville, TN 37996-0701, or call (423) 974-4251.
by David Brill
Environmental and resource economist Jonathan Rubin, a collaborating scientist with the University of Tennessee's Energy, Environment, and Resources Center (EERC) and the economics department, often describes himself as "boring researcher" or even a "techno-nerd." Despite his self- effacing description, Rubin is, in fact, something of a trailblazer.
But unlike 18th and 19th century trailblazers, who carried the Eastern concept of civilization west, Rubin has followed the opposite course.
In fact, he arrives in Tennessee having traveled east from the University of California-Davis. Nevertheless, Rubin arrives at the University of Tennessee set to explore new areas of scholarly research.
Rubin divides his time between EERC and the economics department, where he serves as an assistant professor.
The task of serving two masters carries some considerable challenges. For instance, Rubin hopes to earn his keep at EERC by attracting grant money to the center through his research projects while working to clear the tenure hurdle with the economics department.
Though demanding, Rubin sees his appointment as mutually beneficial to EERC and the economics department. As for the benefits that will accrue to EERC: "As someone involved in state-of-the-art research, Jonathan establishes for us an important link with the theoretical developments taking place in the academic community," says Jack Barkenbus, EERC's acting director.
The economics department, on the other hand, gets an assistant professor involved in real-world applied research. Rubin claims that both EERC and the economics department have granted him autonomy in focusing his research--as long as it pays in the form of grants and publications.
Fortunately, Rubin has chosen to explore an area rife with both financial and environmental opportunity, the field of emissions trading.
In fact, in making the trip from California to the Southeast, Rubin brings with him some innovative policy initiatives aimed at reducing air pollution from our nation's vehicle fleet. That was the focus of Rubin's dissertation.
Currently, California leads the nation in initiatives aimed at reducing auto emissions. The state is experimenting, for instance, with a new way to limit the amount of pollution from the vehicle fleet.
It works this way: Ford manufactures the emissions-efficient Escort, the less-efficient Crown Victoria, and a whole host of other models that fall somewhere in between.
California runs tests on each car and measures its emissions per mile. Based on the results of those tests, Ford averages the emissions of its new cars.
In California, if the fleet average emissions fall below state requirements, Ford passes muster and is then able to trade or sell emissions credits to other manufacturers whose fleet averages don't.
So far so good, says Rubin, but he sees such trading as only the beginning. In his dissertation, Rubin explored the concept of "inter-temporal" emissions trading--that is, allowing companies to bank emissions credits and use them in the future.
Problem is, manufacturers that bank credits are penalized. If, for instance, an auto manufacturer doesn't use its credit within a year, the credit is devalued by 25 percent. If it's not used within two years, it's devalued by 50 percent.
"That's like putting money in a savings account and losing it if you don't spend it," says Rubin. "It really discourages banking." "When we allow someone to bank emissions, we're allowing them to underpollute today and then over-pollute in the future," Rubin explains. Rubin has also researched the innovative notion of allowing fuel suppliers to enter the emissions-trading market in their efforts to supply the fuels for alternative-fueled vehicles.
California law requires that, by 1994, the state's seven largest fuel suppliers must provide a percentage of alternative fuels equal to the percentage of vehicles using those fuels in the fleet.
In other words, if by 2010, 20 percent of California's vehicles are powered by natural gas, the fuel mix of each of the seven suppliers must include 20 percent natural gas. Rubin envisions an emissions-trading system that might be applied to those fuel suppliers.
"In effect, what we'd do is reward a company that has gone beyond requirements in developing alternative fuels," he says, "by allowing it to sell or trade credits to a company that's struggling to comply."
Twenty-five years ago, such ideas--not to mention Rubin's designation as environmental and natural resources economist--would have placed him on the fringes of economics. Today, the field of environmental economics, thanks in part to pioneers like Rubin, is working its way into the mainstream.
"My position at EERC wouldn't have been approved five or 10 years ago," he says. "Since then, my field has gained legitimacy."
The reason? Rubin cites the growing awareness of the value of a clean environment.
"As we become more technologically developed, we realize the relative cost of human manufactured goods vis-a-vis the natural environment is increasing," he says. "In the past, natural resources were in such abundance that we took them for granted and valued them at zero. We now know that the value of a scenic vista or clean air is quite large."
According to Rubin, old-school economists figured gross domestic product based only on manufactured goods, and he insists that we've recognized the need to do better.
"Many economists, myself included, maintain that the only way to assess gross domestic product is to consider the loss in natural amenities," says Rubin. "To do any less leads to a decline in our well being as a society."
by David Brill
Armed with solid information, DOE researchers lend clarity to the sometimes cloudy issue of greenhouse gases and global environmental change.
The Department of Energy's (DOE's) Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center (CDIAC) has earned DOE's highly coveted Exceptional Public Service Award from DOE's Office of Energy Research based on its work with two elusive commodities: atmospheric gases and information.
This past year, Energy Secretary Hazel O'Leary bestowed only three such awards, which recognize significant achievement in support of DOE missions and goals. In this case, the department's mission involves collecting and analyzing data on greenhouse gases and global environmental change. These data are drawn from research centers around the world.
Created in 1982 by DOE to support its Global Change Research Program, CDIAC has evolved into a repository, clearinghouse, and quality-assurance facility for an ever expanding wealth of information on climatic conditions and atmospheric and oceanic levels of carbon dioxide and other trace gases.
Before1982, several research institutions were collecting data on these conditions, but no organization had taken the lead in validating, coordinating, and documenting information.
"CDIAC was able to coordinate the efforts of these research organizations and package the data in a way that pieced together what was happening on a local and regional scale," says Fred Stoss, CDIAC task leader for communications and information systems. "As a result, CDIAC helped provide an accurate global perspective on greenhouse gases and their effects on the environment."
Stoss and six of CDIAC's 22-person staff--which includes meteorologists, oceanographers, chemists, ecologists, library scientists, and geographers-are full-time employees of the Energy, Environment and Resources Center (EERC), an affiliate organization of the Waste Management Research and Education Institute (WMREI) of the University of Tennessee.
Each of CDIAC's 50 available packages contains background information on where, how, and by whom the data were collected; confirmation of the data's reliability; graphs and charts depicting climatic changes and shifts in the levels of greenhouse gases at various monitoring sites; and models for forecasting future trends.
CDIAC makes these information packages available free of charge in a variety of formats, including CD-ROM, magnetic tape, DOS floppy disks, and hard copy. CDIAC data can also be downloaded from the Internet computer information network. To date, says Stoss, CDIAC has distributed more than 80,000 reports and data packages to users in 152 countries.
By providing these users with data packages, CDIAC hopes to offer a reliable and useful knowledge base to those interested in global environmental change.
"You're always going to have the full spectrum of positions on global climate change," says Stoss. "What we hope to do is to provide the most accurate and reliable data on the topic and in the process replace speculation with information."
For more information, contact Fred Stoss,ORNL, P.O. Box 2008, MS 6335, Oak Ridge, TN 37831-6335 or call (423) 574-0390.
by Worth Wilkerson
A large fuel-storage tank erupts at a U.S. Air Force base, spraying jet fuel over an area the size of two football fields. Cleanup crews spring into action and, within a few weeks, soak up most of the fuel. But there's the residue--perhaps as much as 10 percent--that crews can't get with conventional cleanup methods. The specter of digging up and hauling away tons of lightly saturated soil before that residue contaminates the groundwater is a constant source of concern for Air Force officers at the base.
This scenario, although fiction, is a fairly accurate portrait of common environmental incidents that occur at industrial plants and military installations across the country. Millions upon millions of dollars are spent trying to absorb the "final 10 percent" of liquid waste that contaminates soil and threatens groundwater.
Researchers at WMREI's Center for Environmental Biotechnology are working with the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) and the Air Force on a process that could reduce the costs of such cleanups from millions to a few thousand. The process goes by several different names: "intrinsic bioremediation," "natural biodegradation," or "natural restoration," among others.
In a phrase, it simply means "let nature heal itself." The idea is that, if conditions are favorable, naturally occurring microbes will attack and devour the contaminant before it can get off site and do environmental harm.
Two things are necessary, however, before an agency or company can claim natural restoration as a cleanup strategy, emphasize Gary Sayler of UT and Bill Waldrop of TVA. First, it has to be able to accurately predict how the biodegra- dation process will work at the affected site, and second, it has to prove that the process is, in fact, working--that the pollutant is being destroyed on site.
Almost by accident, TVA discovered the process at work at a research site it operates at Columbus Air Force Base in Columbus, Mississippi. It was then that TVA turned to WMREI's Center for Environmental Biotechnology to research the process at the Mississippi site.
"We had been researching groundwater movement at the site since 1983 as part of a major environmental study sponsored by the Electric Power Research Institute and the Air Force," Waldrop explains. "We injected a tracer (tritium) and several organic chemicals in low concentrations into the groundwater and then tracked their movement by taking precise measurements through a system of wells.
"We were able to account for the tracer but not the organic chemicals; most of them simply disappeared. It took some sophisticated analysis to figure out that the indigenous micro- bes ate the chemicals," Waldrop says.
Sayler says the UT research, sponsored by the Air Force Armstrong Laboratory and funded through the Joint Institute for Energy and Environment, will take up where the TVA research left off. Graduate students are currently doing background studies on the site--identifying the indigenous microbes and the chemical and geologic makeup. Additional chemicals then will be injected into the soil and groundwater, and their movement--and expected disappearance--will be closely monitored.
"If natural restoration is a process that is likely to happen at other places, and if we learn enough about it to predict its outcome, this could change the whole national strategy for dealing with spills and other contamination," Waldrop says.
"It's already being applied," he adds. "After we finished our study, the Air Force project manager was able to take our information into a meeting at another Air Force base that had experienced a major spill of jet fuel and cut the cost of the cleanup by $35 million."
Sayler says UT is so impressed with the potential of the process that it offered a special graduate-level course in bioremediation, stressing natural attenuation. The class attracted 20 students.
"There's no question that the potential for cost savings in environmental cleanup is tremendous," Sayler says. "While the process requires extensive site-specific information and sophisticated monitoring, those things are much cheaper-and less environmentally disruptive-than digging up and hauling away whole football fields of dirt."
For more information, contact Gary Sayler, University of Tennessee Center for Environmental Biotechnology, 10515 Research Drive, Knoxville, TN 37932-2567, or call (423) 974-8080.
Ask any small-town mayor or rural county official and he or she will tell you that waste management is no longer an urban problem. In fact, what to do with garbage, or what experts like to call solid waste, has become a top policy concern across rural America.
The way that four small rural communities in the South have addressed this problem is the topic of a recently completed 30-minute video co-sponsored by the University of Tennessee's Energy, Environment, and Resources Center (EERC) and the Tennessee Valley Authority's (TVA) Center for Rural Waste Management.
Titled "The Solid Waste Issue Hits Home", the video uses a "people approach" to tell its story.
Video viewers meet Sandra Palmer, a health-care specialist turned garbage expert from mountainous Hancock County in east Tennessee; the Rev. Charles Bowles and Sister Mary Ann from the Mississippi Delta just south of Memphis, who have spearheaded a drive to clean up the long neglected sharecropper community of Walls, Mississippi; Bill Rice, a retired oil executive who became the recycling coordinator in his home town of Troy, located in the wiregrass country of south central Alabama; and Carl Wright, a former New York City stockbroker who returned home to Tennessee's Cumberland Plateau between Knoxville and Nashville to lead an innovative solid-waste management program.
The video, scripted by Daniel Schaffer and Rosemary Walker, was produced by the University of Tennessee's Center for Video and Telecommunications.
For additional information, contact Daniel Schaffer, Assistant Director, University of Tennessee, EERC, 311 Conference Building, Knoxville, TN 37996-4134 or call 865-974-4251.