Urban Fate and Transport Modeling of Contaminants: The Unique Needs of Emergency Response and the Potential for Adapting Existing Models

Wide area urban contamination events, such as after a terrorist attack or other chemical, biological or radiological disaster, pose a logistical challenge for response and remediation. The extent of contamination, both on the surface and subsurface, directly impacts the costs related to characterization sampling, decontamination, and clearance sampling (e.g. personnel, consumables and waste management). Modeling tools that can predict the location and magnitude of contamination may allow for a more efficient allocation of key resources since wide area incidents may be very costly, and take an extended amount of time, to remediate. This paper identifies 27 existing water models that are able to simulate hydraulic, hydrologic and water quality processes and discusses the necessary adjustments to running the models during remediation activities. It also highlights how these features relate to the unique considerations encountered in the homeland security sector and discusses ongoing research needs.