Environmental Management at Marine Corps Base Camp
Pendleton, California

Installing a compressor for an in situ air sparging system at Camp Pendleton, California

Battelle has been responsible for environmental management at nearly 80 former underground storage tank (UST) sites at Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton in California for the past seven years, under a contract with the U.S. Navy. The importance of this project is reflected by the site, where numerous protected and endangered species, special habitats, and archaeological resources are present on more than 125,000 acres, including approximately 17 miles of Pacific coastline. The base, which is home to 38,000 military personnel and has a daytime population of over 100,000, relies on groundwater for potable water. The former UST units include gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, waste oil, and heating oil, some with releases to soil and groundwater.

Battelle's Environmental Restoration Department assists the Assistant Chief of Staff, Environmental Security Remediation Branch at Camp Pendleton. Based on evaluation of existing data and through collection of additional targeted data, Battelle determined that most of the sites met the low risk soils and/or groundwater criteria established by the San Diego Health Department. Many of these sites have now been closed with no further action needed. Depending upon site conditions, Battelle has implemented a number of remediation technologies, including hot spot excavation, in situ air sparging, bioslurping, and soil vapor extraction. At most of the remaining sites, Battelle staff has worked with Navy personnel and regulators for permission to manage the sites using remediation by natural attenuation. The effectiveness of this approach is demonstrated by collection of indicator parameters, followed by groundwater monitoring.

As a database for each site has been developed, Battelle has successfully reduced monitoring requirements by eliminating chemical parameters, reducing the monitoring frequency, and eliminating redundant monitoring wells. This has resulted in significant cost avoidance for the base, allowing resources to be moved toward management of other sites.

For more information about Battelle's capabilities in environmental management and site remediation, contact Phil Jagucki at (614) 424-7081, jagucki@battelle.org.