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The U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) both have programs tasked with determining if military training and testing facilities present a risk to human health and the environment. DoD has established the Military Munitions Response Program (MMRP) and Operational Range Assessment Program (ORAP) that have requirements to perform site investigations. USEPA has become involved in the characterization of energetic residues on military training ranges and the potential for off-site migration through ongoing investigations of the Massachusetts Military Reservation (MMR).
The objectives of this demonstration/validation project were to promote scientifically defendable sampling and sample processing protocols for the characterization of energetic residues on military training ranges. The principal mechanism for meeting this objective was to inform potential users of the sampling and sample processing protocols developed under the Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program (SERDP) projects ER-1155 and ER-1481. These sampling and sample processing protocols were promoted by:
The sample processing recommended in Method 8330B was demonstrated to be scientifically sound for obtaining representative subsamples. In the majority of cases, uncertainty among triplicate subsamples removed from soil samples over 1,200 g in mass was less than 10% relative standard deviation (RSD), and the average was within 10% relative percent difference (RPD) of the concentration obtained for the remainder of the sample.
In all cases, tighter tolerances were obtained for five MULTI INCREMENT samples as compared to 30 discrete samples for the calculation of upper confidence limits (UCL). That is, the calculation of 95% UCLs of the mean based on 30 randomly selected discrete samples produced a range of values often twice that derived from five MULTI INCREMENT samples and greater than the variation among the values established for 10 MULTI INCREMENT samples. Estimates of the 95% UCL of the mean based on only five discrete samples were either unreasonable or unreliable (unrepeatable), or both.
ProUCL, the statistical software, estimates of the UCLs of the mean based on 100 discrete samples were higher than:
The posting of Method 8330B on the Web addressed most of the issues initially expressed by potential stakeholders and end-users. Within 18 months of posting, commercial laboratory services became available, removing the only remaining limitation to full-scale implementation.