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aquatic disposal alternatives, such as capping and sand overlaying for contaminated 
dredged material, design, construction and management of diked containment areas 
for contaminated dredged material; and, improved analytic methods and manage- 
ment tools for assessing dredged material impacts. Information gained through the 
MOU was used extensively in the DMRP and continues to be used in current re- 
search. For example, the majority of the Corps guidance on resuspension of sedi- 
ments during dredging operations is based on Japanese data. We hope to imple- 
ment, in the near future, several joint United States/Japan studies involving the 
use of specialized equipment for dredging contaminated sediments. The successful 
exchange of information under this program has recently led to the signing of a 
similar MOU between the Corps and the Dutch government. 
The MPRSA requires that the substance of agreements reached by the Contract- 
ing Parties to the London Dumping Convention (LDC) through international treaty 
(Public Law 92-254) be accounted for in the ocean dumping regulations of the 
United States. As the regulation of and research in dredged material disposal activi- 
ties in the United States is a direct Corps responsibility, the Corps provides both a 
policy and a scientific advisor on the U.S. delegation to the consultative sessions, 
and a scientific advisor to the scientific sessions. I am the Corps policy advisor. 
The LDC has developed a set of broad dredged material exclusions from the man- 
datory biological and chemical testing for prohibited materials that are required for 
other waste materials proposed for ocean disposal. In a recent session, representa- 
tives to the LDC expressed significant interest in innovative aquatic disposal site 
management techniques such as “capping” as a means of “rapidly rendering harm- 
less” contaminants associated with dredged material. However, the consensus of del- 
egates was that these efforts should continue at present as experimental efforts and 
be fully researched and monitored. The delegates also felt that these techniques 
were within the legal restrictions of the LDC. The Corps is presently evaluating 
these and other experimental approaches to aquatic disposal of contaminated mate- 
rials at several sites within the northeastern United States. 
It became apparent during the latter portion of the DMRP that it would be neces- 
sary to provide a technology transfer activity to ensure that the large volume of en- 
gineering/scientific data and results-of the DMRP, as well as regulatory and other 
research on dredged materials, would be available to the Corps divisions and dis- 
tricts as well as to the engineering/scientific community at large. To meet these 
needs, the Dredging Operations Technical Support (DOTS) Program was established 
by the Corps in April 1978, and the responsibility for the management of the pro- 
gram was assigned to the Waterways Experiment Station’s Environmental Labora- 
tory. The DOTS program also supplies needed expertise on an “on call” basis to 
Corps districts and divisions when site specific problems arise. 
The Corps’ responsibilities for regulating the disposal of dredged material, includ- 
ing contaminated materials, directly involve and impact upon a number of environ- 
mental media, including inland waters, wetlands, estuaries, terrestrial habitats, and 
the ocean. It is our responsibility to insure the maximum possible protection to each 
of these media in our Federal activities, as well as in the management of our 
dredged material regulatory programs. 
Two fundamental management conclusions drawn from the DMRP have been 
quite instrumental in guiding our research on dredged material disposal and in for- 
mulating our approach to regulating our own as well as permitted dredged material 
disposal activities. The first is that there is no single dredged material disposal al- 
ternative that presumptively is most suitable for a region, for a type of dredged ma- 
terial, or for a group of projects. Correspondingly, there is no inherent effect or 
characteristic of a dredged material disposal alternative that rules it out of consid- 
eration from an environmental standpoint prior to specific on-site evaluations. 
It is not technically sound, for example, to make the general statements that 
ocean disposal must be phased out or that all material in the Great Lakes classified 
as polluted must be confined behind dikes. To do this would be contrary to research 
results that have indicated that there can be situations where there is greater prob- 
ability of adverse environmental impacts from confined disposal than from open- 
water disposal. Yet, in other situations, such as when certain types of contaminants 
are present in unacceptable amounts, confined disposal may provide the greatest 
degree of environmental protection. 
Implications of this conclusion from a management point of view are fully recog- 
nized. Case-by-case evaluations are time consuming and expensive and may serious- 
ly complicate advanced planning and funding requests. Nevertheless, such an ap- 
proach is needed to insure that tens of millions of dollars are not spent for alterna- 
tives that contribute to adverse environmental effects rather than reduce them. 
