Local Enforcement Agency Correspondence

Alternative Final Cover Assessment Training

Date: March 22, 2001

To: All Local Enforcement Agencies

The Integrated Waste Management Board and the State Water Resources Control Board in partnership with Desert Research Institute would like to invite you to an Alternative Final Cover Assessment training course. Mr. William Albright of Desert Research Institute will instruct the course.

The training will cover the following topics:

• An overview of RCRA prescriptive landfill caps.
• An overview of the Alternative Cover Assessment Program, a national study in which four California landfill sites are involved. This will include site specific details and problems, along with many photographs of the sites involved.
• Site Specific Design Criteria (soil, climate, vegetation, modeling, etc).
• Discussion of the meaning of "equivalency" as it pertains to regulatory approval.

Two main questions that will be discussed during the course are:

• What design input data do we not know enough about? In other words, where do we have to be conservative in design?
• What happens when we take away the prescriptive design and move towards site-specific designs? Will this allow regulators to understand and evaluate Closure Plans adequately?

There will be six venues throughout the State of California. The dates and locations for this training are as follows: 

Instructor Information:

Mr. Albright has completed a Master’s Degree in Hydrogeology at the University of Nevada, Reno. Mr. Albright’s research and experience are focused on the movement of water in the vadose zone, and in particular, very dry soils. These studies include soil property measurements and hydrologic impacts of waste facility design. Mr. Albright is directly involved in the U.S. EPA-sponsored Alternative Cover Assessment Program to which California is contributing.

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