On Wednesday, August 5th, Dr. Michael Sklash, P. Eng. will be among a group of scientists, engineers, and lawyers speaking at the International Network on Environmental Forensics, which is part of the Royal Society of Chemistry. The conference will be held at Victoria College in Toronto.
The title of Mike’s presentation is, “How would Albert Einstein do as a forensics expert? The Art of Effectively Communicating Complex Information.” Mike will be co-presenting with Natalie Mullins, a lawyer at Gowlings. If you are in the Greater Toronto Area and are able to attend, we encourage you to consider signing up.
Whether you are able to attend or not, we thought this might be a good opportunity to learn about the practical application of environmental forensics.
Question: What is Environmental Forensics?
Mike Sklash: For me, environmental forensics is the use of specific test data to determine the “who, what, where, and when” of a release to soil or groundwater.
Question: What’s behind the title of your talk, “How would Albert Einstein do as a forensics expert? The Art of Effectively Communicating Complex Information”?
Mike Sklash: I know that I am not the smartest guy out there, nor do I have the most expertise in any of the many areas of environmental forensics. But I am at least pretty good in most of the areas, and I think I am very good at putting the pieces of the puzzle together and explaining them to non-specialists (like judges, juries, CEOs) so they understand the problem and can solve the puzzle with me. I have run into many very bright experts during my 25+ years of expert witnessing, but many of these people only focused on one type of evidence without considering others, could not effectively communicate with the non-specialists, or didn’t understand the nuances of answering questions from lawyers or judges. It got me thinking, “How would a genius like Albert Einstein do as an expert witness?”
Question: Can you offer some practical applications of Environmental Forensics?
Mike Sklash: One great example is a gasoline-release site where our client just couldn’t get the remediation completed, and the regulator wanted further delineation. When we looked at the site, we did a detailed review of the groundwater flow directions and temporal changes in the groundwater flow directions. We then looked at the groundwater elevations (which were somewhat “controlled”) versus the vertical distribution of contamination in soil and groundwater. Finally, we dated the age of the release based on benzene, toluene, exthylbenzene, and xylene ratios, and other factors. In the end, all the pieces of this puzzle fit together and we demonstrated that our client was actually stuck cleaning up a second release that did not originate from their site. We closed the site soon after with no further remediation required of our client.
Another great example is also a gasoline-release site where a gas station had two successive owners, and there were releases during both ownerships. How much of the downgradient subdivision did each owner impact? The other expert relied on the observed distribution of a particular chemical in “their” gasoline that was not in “our” gasoline to conclude how large of an area their releases (which occurred after “our” releases) had impacted. The other expert didn’t account for two things. First, he didn’t pay attention to the groundwater flow patterns, so he didn’t sample in the right place. Second, he didn’t consider the extent of retardation of his signature chemical; his signature chemical moved much more slowly than groundwater and much more slowly than the chemicals used to delineate the extent of impact, like benzene and MTBE. Our side was very happy with the ruling in this case.
Question: When should someone consider using Environmental Forensics?
Mike Sklash: I like to use environmental forensics, incorporating multiple techniques when I can’t afford to be wrong. My philosophy is that there is only one right answer out there and that we never can get all of the information – after all, everything we do is happening underground – the answer doesn’t just pop out. Using environmental forensics with multiple techniques helps you to build a more robust conceptual site model of what is going on underground. Each technique will give an answer, and all of the answers have to be consistent. So, for court cases and projects where we have done a peer review and are taking a project over from another company, I want to be confident, and I want to be right.
Question: Any final thoughts?
Mike Sklash: In environmental forensics, all the puzzle pieces have to fit.
If you have any questions relating to environmental forensics and whether it might be right in your particular situation, contact Dr. Michael Sklash, P. Eng. (msklash@dragun.com) at 416-800-2140, ext 120.