One project that demonstrates the potential cost savings and/or cost avoidances possible by the use of remote sensing capabilities is the Waste Area Grouping (WAG) 4 Strategic Environmental Research and Development Project (SERDP).* At WAG 4, Solid Waste Storage Area (SWSA) 4 covers approximately 23 acres. From 1951 until 1959, SWSA 4 received a variety of low- and higher-activity-level radioactive wastes, including transuranic wastes, all buried in trenches or auger holes. A fire destroyed most of the burial activity records. Surface water sampling data indicate that a substantial quantity of contamination (⁹⁰Sr) is being released from the burial trenches at SWSA 4. These trenches have contributed 25% of the ⁹⁰Sr release observed at White Oak Dam during the period of 1987 - 1994 and about 14% of the total Oak Ridge National Laboratory off-site risk via the drinking water pathway.

At WAG 4, the SERDP project was conducted to determine the benefits of national remote sensing technologies for environmental restoration applications. WAG 4 was an ER Site with unknown trench areas and was on the fast track for an interim remedial action decision. Through the use of remote sensing imagery we were able to produce a trench map of the WAG 4 Site. The map was based on historical and current remote sensing and aerial survey information. The trench map was then used by the WAG 4 technical manager to direct other ground-based characterizations to further delineate the trenches.
  

                                                                                                                                            Fusion of Remotely Sensed Data

The field investigation at WAG 4 identified six individual seep areas, and suggested that two of them contributed over 90% of the ⁹⁰Sr release from the study area. The SERDP trench map was then the key factor in allowing a precise sampling study to pinpoint localized sources feeding the major seeps. It is believed that control of these few sources is the key to a cost-effective interim action to reduce ⁹⁰Sr releases and off-site risk. Without the remote sensing results, the ability to quickly and effectively pinpoint the locations of the individual sources would have been lost. The most likely alternative for controlling releases under that scenario (cap the site, collect and treat the surface water) has been estimated to cost in excess of $5 million more than the preferred alternative to directly control the sources.

*The Oak Ridge SERDP project team included members of the following organizations: the ER Remote Sensing Program, the ER WAG 4 Site Investigation EPIC team, the National Security Program Office, and personnel from the Environmental Research Institute of Michigan.