16 



3.0 APPROACH TO A TIERED 

 MONITORING SCHEME FOR 

 AQUATIC DISPOSAL 



Monitoring can be defined in many 

 ways and has had many historical 

 uses, usually with an emphasis on 

 repeated time-series measurements; 

 depending on the needs of a particular 

 situation, monitoring can include 

 conceptual and numerical modeling, 

 laboratory and field research, 

 preliminary or scoping studies, time 

 series measurements, data analysis, 

 synthesis, interpretation, etc. Even 

 though monitoring can be conducted 

 for a variety of purposes, there are 

 three broad categories of problems to 

 which it is applied as a solution 

 (National Research Council, 1990): 



three categories; fortunately, there are 

 a host of excellent works that provide 

 advice on the design and 

 implementation of environmental 

 monitoring (e.g., Holling, 1978, Green, 

 1979, 1984; Beanlands and Duinker, 

 1983; Rosenberg et al., 1981; Bernstein 

 and Zalinski,1986;Fredette et al., 1986). 

 However, before launching into an 

 explanation of the first tiered 

 monitoring flowchart (Figure 2), it 

 would be worthwhile to review the 

 background of thought instrumental in 

 structuring this particular monitoring 

 plan specifically designed to address 

 the regional concerns and 

 environmental impacts of dredged 

 material disposal in New England. 



3.1 Objectives 



• Compliance , to ensure that 

 activities are carried out in 

 accordance with permit 

 requirements or regulations; 



• Model verification , to check the 

 validity of assumptions or 

 predictions generated for sampling 

 design, permitting, or evaluation of 

 management alternatives such as 

 when to cap, etc.; 



• Trend monitoring , to identify and 

 quantify longer-term 

 environmental changes 

 hypothesized or anticipated as a 

 possible consequence of human 

 activity. A well designed trend 

 monitoring program should be able 

 to identify natural as well as 

 anthropogenic effects. 



Aspects of the proposed DAMOS 

 tiered monitoring program address all 



Monitoring of dredged material 

 disposal sites has four primary 

 objectives: (1) assuring that disposal 

 operations (both federal and permit) 

 are completed as directed (compliance 

 monitoring); (2) verifying that disposed 

 sediment and the interaction of the 

 benthic community behave as 

 expected during and following 

 disposal (model verification); (3) 

 providing information that will allow 

 optimum utilization of the disposal 

 sites (trend monitoring); and, (4) 

 assuring that disposal activities are in 

 compliance with environmental laws 

 and regulations (compliance and trend 

 monitoring). 



The second and third objectives 

 may have different approaches 

 depending upon whether the site 

 being managed is a dispersive or 

 non-dispersive site. There is only one 

 dispersive site, Cornfield Shoals, 



An Integrated, Tiered Approach to Monitoring and Management of Dredged Material Disposal Sites 



