Glossary

Term	Definition
Accelerated Site Characterization	A process for characterizing contaminated sites using primarily professional judgment-based sampling and measurements (performed in this case) by an integrated reuse team. The team operates within the framework of a dynamic work strategy that allows flexibility in the selection of the type and location of measurements, ensuring that data collection activities can be optimized during a limited number of field mobilizations.
Brownfield	Brownfields, as defined by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, are "abandoned, idled, or under-used industrial and commercial facilities where expansion or redevelopment is complicated by real or perceived environmental contamination."
Conceptual Site Model (CSM)	Any site depiction(s) or representation(s) used to conceptualize or model contamination concerns to make predictions about the nature and extent of contamination, the risk of exposure, and risk reduction strategies. May also be termed a conceptual model.
Contaminant	Any hazardous substance, hazardous constituent, hazardous waste, or pollutant discharged by any individual or entity to the environment.
Contaminant Delineation	The systematic collection and analysis of samples to determine the vertical and horizontal extent of contamination above some standard.
Contaminant Screening	The analysis of soil, surface water, groundwater, sediment, and air (also known as environmental media or matrix) by nonspecific methods to make a preliminary determination of the presence of a contaminant above some standard.
Data Set	Analytical results for samples that are grouped in some way. Typically, a data set comes from a single population under investigation for the purpose of providing input into a specific decision.
Dynamic Work Strategy (DWS)	A work strategy for contaminated site characterization, remediation, or monitoring (or a combination thereof), where activities have built-in flexibility guided by a preapproved decision logic. As information is gathered, it is used to make decisions in real time about what subsequent activities will best resolve remaining data and decision uncertainties. The goal is to mature the conceptual site model and complete remedial actions in as few field mobilizations as feasible. As with all environmental projects under regulatory oversight, all planned work activities should be described in written work planning documents appropriate to the overseeing program.
Environmental Media	Substances (e.g., air, surface water, soil, groundwater, and sediment) that contain the contaminant of interest.
Field-Based Decision Criteria	Decision (or action) levels that are used to guide in-field decisions based on the real-time results of field methods. These criteria are structured to ensure that the correct decision is made, compensating for any bias or imprecision in the analytical method.
Field-Based Measurement Technologies	Equivalent term to "on-site analytical methods," "field analytical methods," "field analytics," and similar terms that are used to denote the instrumentation and methods used to perform real-time analyses in proximity to sample collection. Implementation ranges from hand-held instruments used outdoors to full-scale mobile laboratories.
Interferences (in analysis)	Interferences are factors that may cause a test result to appear to be significantly higher or lower than the actual value.
Quality Assurance Project Plan	Any document that presents, in specific terms, the policies, organization, objectives, functional activities, and specific quality assurance/quality control activities designed to achieve the quality goals or objectives of a specific project or operation.
Real-Time Measurement Technologies (RTMS)	Any data generation and interpretation mechanisms that support real-time decision making (e.g., dynamic work strategies). The term includes geophysical and other imaging techniques that can support real-time conceptual site model development. The term also includes analytical results with rapid turnaround from a fixed laboratory (using either standard or screening analytical methods), or field-based measurement technologies. The term also includes databases and software that permit real-time data management, review, assessment, reduction, mapping, decision assistance, and sharing of data among data users.
Result (analytical result)	The value reported for a measured or computed quantity after sample analysis.
Sample	A portion of a population taken and analyzed to make estimations about the characteristics of that population.
Site Screening	Term used to describe rapid or partial surveying of a site, possibly with chemical analysis instrumentation or methods, in an effort to estimate worst-case environmental conditions or to develop a preliminary conceptual site model (i.e., estimating the presence and extent of contaminated vs. noncontaminated matrix populations). See also contaminant screening.
Standard Analytical Method	Methods that determine the identity and concentration of contaminants with "reasonable" and known certainty. This term is used to describe the familiar and commonly used methods that fixed laboratories use to analyze contaminants in environmental media.
Systematic Project Planning	A planning process that lays a scientifically defensible foundation for proposed project activities. Systematic project planning usually includes identification of key decisions to be made, the development of a conceptual site model to support decision making, and an evaluation of decision uncertainty along with approaches for managing that uncertainty in the context of the conceptual site model. If the collection of environmental data from representative populations is desired to support decision making, then sampling, analytical, and relational uncertainties in the data-generation process must be managed. Systematic planning is an iterative process that continues throughout the life cycle of a project.
Triad Approach	The Triad Approach includes systematic project planning, real-time measurement technologies, and dynamic work strategies. By using modern technologies and strategies to rapidly and efficiently build a CSM tailored to support site-specific risk and remedial decision-making needs, the Triad Approach is the most cost-effective way to accomplish uncertainty management.
Uncertainty	Generally used to convey the idea of not having enough information about something. Variability in the concentrations of contaminants is one factor that contributes to uncertainty, as is the inability to decide how to reuse or revitalize a site.
Underground Storage Tank (UST)	Any one or combination of tanks (including underground pipes connected thereto) that contain an accumulation of regulated substances, and the volume of which (including the volume of underground pipes connected thereto) is 10 percent or more beneath the surface of the ground.
Variability	Differences caused by the diversity (differences) of a population.

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