Spatially explicit exposure models: application to military sites

Abstract

As a result of defense-related activities, large areas of valuable habitats can be physically disturbed and/or contaminated by hazardous pollutants. It is, however, important to understand that the military impact on such areas may not be wholly detrimental to the environment: their closure to the public can result in environmental conservation of large portions of habitat. Many former military ranges have been converted for civil usage; others are still actively operated for military purposes. In both cases, a major task for environmental policy- and decision-makers is to determine scientifically justified reuse and/or operation scenarios that would not result in deterioration of site habitats and that would in fact be favorable to further development of biodiversity within the areas’ existing ecosystems. Ecological risk assessment is suggested as the key process to use in facilitating the assessment of the ecological value of contaminated and/or disturbed military sites and in the development of a reuse decision protocol. We are currently developing and integrating a number of risk and habitat assessment techniques into such a protocol. This paper presents our approach to one aspect of this system: the incorporation of spatial information into ecological risk assessment. We present a software prototype that calculates radionuclide accumulation by deer foraging in areas having specified contamination patterns.

Keywords

decision support ecological risk assessment military sites modeling risk analysis

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