Member Program Descriptions
    Technology Innovation and Field Services Division

Technology Innovation and Field Services Division

The mission of the Technology Innovation and Field Services Division (TIFSD) is to provide both high-quality technology information, and field and laboratory support to customers that respond to the emergency release of hazardous materials and manage longer-term site assessment and remediation projects. TIFSDs advocates more effective, less costly approaches by government and industry to investigate and clean up contaminated waste sites, soil, and ground water. Working with other federal agencies, consulting engineering firms, responsible parties, technology developers, and the investment community, the division provides technology and market information and works to remove policy and institutional impediments related to the deployment of these technologies. The scope of the mission extends to Superfund sites, corrective action sites under RCRA, underground storage tank clean-ups, state clean up programs and Brownfields. The program focuses on field sampling and analysis technologies and remediation technologies applicable to contaminated soil and ground water.

CERCLA Section 311 (b)(1) authorizes the Agency to carry out a program of research, evaluation, testing, development and demonstration of alternative treatment technologies for remediation of hazardous waste sites. Section 311 (b)(3) provides the authority to provide project grants to nonprofit entities. Section 311 (b)(8) authorizes the technology transfer program activities, and Section 311 (b)(9) authorizes training for state (and other) employees in the procedures for handling and removal of hazardous substances. In addition, TIFSD supports remediation programs under RCRA, and other statutes.

Overall Purpose:
TIFSD, supports the goals in the Superfund Amendments and Reauthorization Act of 1986 and other statutes to stress the importance of permanent remedies and innovative treatment technologies in cleaning up hazardous waste sites.

Program Role in Protecting Ground Water:
The division works to protect ground water by creating an information support program for technology decision makers to assist them in addressing contamination of ground water and other media. It offers characterization and remediation technology selection tools and describes programs, organizations, and publications for all stakeholders in the hazardous waste remediation community. It also offers site-specific technology support through the Environmental Response Team (ERT), and manages the EPA's program for providing reliable, high volume, cost effective chemical analyses for site studies through the Analytical Services Branch (ASB). ASB is also breaking new ground in the modernization of laboratory services and electronic data management.

TIFSD develops and supports the development of guides and technical reports that summarize the state-of-art of numerous characterization and remediation technologies and provides technical, cost, and performance information to help the remediation community. Both EPA and non-EPA technology information is made available on the CLU-IN web site.

Remediation guides and reports include detailed descriptions and applications of innovative ground water cleanup technologies, tools on how to select appropriate technologies for a site, and information on specific contaminants of concern.

Characterization and monitoring reports include descriptions of characterization technologies, case studies and evaluations, and educational, policy, and guidance materials on systematic planning, dynamic work plans, field applications, sampling design, and sample collection and handling.

Vendor support guides provide information for technology vendors and developers on trends in the markets for site characterization and remediation technologies and how to advance technologies through all stages of development from bench scale to full commercialization.

Areas of Flexibility:
N/A

In addition to providing current information on measurement, monitoring, and treatment of ground water, TIFSD has a number of ground water related initiatives.

The Optimization Initiative for pump-and-treat systems supports systematic monitoring and evaluation of these systems to detect and respond to changes in performance. System optimization offers benefits that include enhanced protectiveness, reduced cost, shortened cleanup times, and the increased likelihood of site closeout. Under this initative, EPA evaluated systems at Superfund, RCRA, and UST sites, and recommended ways to optimize performance. EPA has also prepared several fact sheets on improving design and operation of systems.

TIFSD also sponsors and operates a number of web sites, data bases, publications, forums, coalitions, and projects that address ground water characterization and remediation technologies.

The division supports approximately twenty databases relating to site characterization and remediation technologies and issues. Many of these relate to the availability, performance, and cost of technologies for cleaning up ground water, and the selection of ground water treatment technologies in the Superfund program. The following are selected resources that can be found on the web site.

TIFSD conducts and participates in numerous initiatives and partnerships to exchange information and provide forums for joint activity on issues related to innovative technologies for hazardous waste site characterization and remediation. Some examples of these initiatives include:

The Technology Innovation and Field Services Division supports a host of publications on characterization, remediation, and monitoring technologies, and related issues, initiatives, partnerships, regulations, and vendor support information. In addition, the division hosts TechDirect, an information service on new publications and events of interest to site remediation and site assessment professionals. Information on the availability of publications and events is distributed to subscribers on a monthly basis.