Drawing on experts in environmental engineering,
biology, chemistry and other disciplines, Johns Hopkins has
launched a new center to provide a more detailed
understanding of hazardous contaminants in urban
environments. One goal is to help regulators and property
owners make better decisions regarding when pollutants need
to be removed or neutralized — and how this can best
be accomplished. Another aim is to assist regulators in
establishing contamination limits.
The Center for Contaminant Transport, Fate and
Remediation will look at a broad range of pollutants,
including metals and organic materials that are found in
water, soil, sediment and air. Its initial focus will be
urban areas of the northeastern United States, where many
years of industrial development have left soil and water
supplies tainted with hazardous materials.
Government agencies have adopted general rules that
regulate what levels of pollution are unacceptable, but
critical knowledge gaps exist, said Edward J. Bouwer,
director of the new CTFR Center. For example, sediment
— a mixture of soil and water — often contains
more than one contaminant. "These chemicals may interact,"
he said. "It is difficult to make cleanup decisions based
only on the limits allowed for a single pollutant."
The CTFR Center's first research sponsor, Honeywell
International, has provided funding to study chromium
contamination in Baltimore's harbor. "Regulators are
considering how much chromium should be permitted," Bouwer
said. "But chromium can be present in two different forms,
one significantly more toxic and more likely to migrate
than the other. Before we can make cleanup recommendations,
we have to figure out the precise chemical makeup of the
sediment at the bottom of the harbor. There's a chemical
'soup' out there, and we have to tease out the most
hazardous parts."
Richard Eskin, director of the Technical and
Regulatory Services Administration within the Maryland
Department of the Environment, said that "the chemistry
controlling chromium behavior in estuaries is complex, and
peer-reviewed research proposed by the center should be
useful in providing a better understanding of the long-term
behavior of chromium in the Baltimore harbor."
To explore contamination questions like this,
including how pollutants are likely to move and what health
threats they pose, the CTFR Center will draw on more than a
dozen faculty experts from three Johns Hopkins divisions
— the Whiting School of Engineering, the Krieger
School of Arts and Sciences and the Bloomberg School of
Public Health — and from the University of Maryland,
Baltimore County. Collaborative relations with other
institutions are also planned.
These researchers will help the center develop a
better understanding of physical, chemical and biological
processes in order to detect, assess and manage the risks
associated with the transport and fate of toxic chemicals
in urban environments. "We plan to draw on a broad range of
expertise to reduce the uncertainty that surrounds many
contamination hazards and to make precise suggestions about
remediation," said Bouwer, a professor in the Whiting School's
Department of
Geography and Environmental Engineering.
Kim Coble, Maryland executive director of the
Chesapeake Bay Foundation, said, "This new center promises
to improve our basic understanding of environmental
pollutants and the hazards they present. We believe the
research conducted by these scientists will provide
valuable help in efforts to restore the health of the
Chesapeake Bay and preserve other priceless natural
resources."
Each research project will be funded by a party that
has a stake in the outcome of a particular contamination
issue. These may include industrial firms, private property
owners, local communities and government agencies. Bouwer
emphasized, however, that the center will bring no
preconceived bias to its research and will disseminate its
findings publicly, regardless of what the scientists
discover or who provided the funding.
"The purpose of the center is to provide independent,
nonpartisan research," Bouwer said. "The impartiality of
the center is critical to its success. The people who fund
our research can review the findings and make comments, but
they can't restrain publication."
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