Minutes from Methods Board Meeting

USGS Center, Reston, VA, December 6-8, 1999

Executive Summary

Participants

Richard Ayers           Virginia DEQ                                Steve Posavec          AWWA/ Std. Methods

Archie Greenberg      Standard Methods                        Bernie Malo             ASTM

Manja Blazer             IDEXX                                         Rick Dunn                Hach Co.

Herb Brass             USEPA, OW, Co-chair                Charlie Peters          USGS, WRD, Co-chair

Bob Berger               East Bay MVD/WEF/AMSA        Elane Streets            Argonne National Lab

Ed Santoro                Delaware RBC                             Geoffrey Ekechukwu  USFW

Gil Dictor                  IDEXX                                         Harold Aroudel        USGS, WRD

Ann Strong                US Army COE                             Chuck Spooner        USEPA, OW

Cliff Annis                 Merck & Co./CMA                      Jerry Diamond          Tetra Tech

Abby Markowitz       Tetra Tech                                    Chuck Job                 USEPA, OW

Bob Hirsch                USGS, WRD                                Elizabeth Fellows     USEPA

Jim Hanlon                USEPA, OW                                Katherine Alben        NY DH

Steve Moulton           USGS, WRD                                Dennis McChesney   USEPA Reg. 2

Larry Keith                WPI                                             Matt Brinn                 ETCC

Bill Wilbur                 USGS, WRD                                Glen Patterson           USGS, WRD

Marion Thompson     USEPA, OW                                Harry House              USGS, WRD

Andy Eaton               Montgomery Watson                    Mary Verwolf            USDOE

Wayne Hood             Arizona DEQ                                Roger Stewart            Virginia DEQ

Dario DalSanto          RT Institute                                   Lynn Bradley             APHL

Mario Castenada       Arizona DEQ                                Jocelyn Smith            Systems Develop.

Center

Announcements

·             Chuck Spooner announced that a Draft Coastal Monitoring Action Plan (addressing Clean Water Action Plan action item #60) is available for review.  The MDCB is not mentioned in the Draft Plan, however, the Plan recognizes the need for comparable methods and data of known quality.  The Board should consider reviewing and commenting on the Plan and linking with coastal/marine system activities (through NOAA and other organizations).

·             Clean Water Act 106(e) funds from EPA to states could be used to leverage better coordination of monitoring within and between states.

National Council Meeting, November, 1999, Rhode Island

Charlie summarized outcomes of the meeting relevant to the Board:

·             Consider one public outreach group shared by Council and Board

·             Consider addressing microbiological DNA typing methods in Biology Workgroup

·             Consider developing a document that assesses the comparability of nutrient methods

·             Consider nutrient pilot to address methodological aspects of TMDLs, nutrient criteria

·             Consider connecting the Board’s WQDE Workgroup with the Councils’ Data Management Workgroup, with a potential for the council assuming responsibility for the activity.

Biology Workgroup

·             WQDE needs input from Biology — some data elements may not match NEMI Biological data fields.  Biology will supply WQDE with comments by end of December.

·             Microbiological methods (and may be all organism count methods) may not be unlike analytical and immunoassay methods in their types of NEMI fields.

·             The NEMI biological tables could be a useful prototype as part of a paper or other product for public response.

·             Donna working on microbiology sampling methods.

·             QA/QC for biological community laboratory methods needs clearly defined standards.  Steve Moulton, Mike Miller, Sam Stribling, and Jim Carter will discuss options/strategies, and draft NEMI tables.

·             Need consistency, keywords in NEMI fields data (data dictionary).  Workgroup will review current NEMI Biology tables and give Jerry feedback on suggestions.

·             Metadata needs to be separated from QA/QC requirements in the NEMI tables.

·             Most current “Method-specific requirements” in tables should be moved to “QA/QC requirements”.

·             Group needs to review the PBMS draft paper for biological community methods and give comments to Jerry.  This paper could be a stand-alone product as well as input to the PBMS Workgroup.

·             Richard, possibly Donna, will report back on DNA typing methods.  The Workgroup will then decide if and how to address these methods.

·             Need to define boundaries for biological measures and methods.  Do we include health effects for example?

·             The Biology group needs flexibility and independence as well as integration with NEMI and PBMS workgroups.

·             Katherine designated as Outreach representative.

Accreditation

·             Position Paper: Review handout of latest draft of position paper.  Could paper be fact sheet length with appendices that include various details?  Make clear that NELAC is handling states and compliance.  This paper is about how (or if) and why federal and ambient monitoring entities should be accredited.  Include relevance of PBMS.  Point out gap if all states don’t accept NELAC.

·             PT Program: Harold will talk to Bob, Wendy, etc. at NELAC to get agreement on the summary of the call between the workgroup and EPA representatives.  Will also get NELAC response to the discussion.  Appropriate mechanisms to deliver concerns will be considered.

·             Outreach and Integration: Will ask Bart Simmons to be the Accreditation workgroup outreach representative.  Need to consider the target audience for both the position paper and the PT program discussion.  Get both on the Board and NELAC websites, in EPA newsletter (Herb), environmental lab, Washington report, (Cliff, Andy, Jerry Parr), ACS newsletter and Environmental Testing (Larry), Water Week, etc.

Outreach Workgroup

·             Rick Dunn and Cliff Annis will serve as new co-chairs of the Outreach Workgroup.

·             Agreed to have liaisons from each Workgroup on Outreach to help with web sites, etc.

·             Discussed web site and received comments.  Need to have Karen Klima (USEPA) review it and help make it look more interesting.  Maybe model the web page after ACWI.

·             Brief discussions about workgroup mission and plans.

·             Discussed outreach letter and table.  Need additional newsletter addresses and contacts sent to Charlie. Need to update web pages before mailing.

·             Check on announcing meetings in the Federal register.

WQDE Workgroup

·             Reviewed chemical elements table.  There are about 35 elements currently which fall into three groups: site description, sample description, and result description.  Specific definitions will need to be developed for each of these.

·             Bio group will do a review.

·             Results aspects will need to be closely integrated with NEMI and their definitions.

·             Discussed workshop in April: 3 hours, an intro presentation, breakout groups, report back and discussion/summary.

·             Conference call in next couple weeks - more detail on elements and workshop agenda.

·             Outreach liaison will be Bob Berger in interim but need to explore another representative for future.  Wayne Hood, Ellen McCarron, and Chuck Job starting to discuss linkage with NMC.  Action item for Chuck J - thorough discussion with Wayne Hood - focus WQDE in NMC?  Concern that WQDE is recognized as being a Board-initiated activity if moved to NMC.

PBMS Workgroup

·             Dennis has protocol for initial demonstration and on-going QA/QC for ambient analytical work.  He will share with the group.

·             Reviewed comments and draft responses to comments on COD Pilot Study Protocol.

·             ARA may provide standards (spike material) for pilot at little or no cost.  Cliff, Andy will look into.

·             Analyses of data will probably be done by Tetra Tech as part of EPA contract support.

·             Suggest KHP as spike material as this was used to validate the approved COD method.

·             Tetra Tech will prepare responses to comments and draft version 2.0 of the protocol by end of December.  In responses to reviewers, include offer to discuss or talk to Board members.

·             Matt reviewed CRADA specifications.  Get list of prospective participants to Matt by end of December.  Dennis’ lab may be a participant?  DuPont?  EPA Region 3?  USGS lab?

·             Matt will re-draft cover letter by end of December.

·             Anticipated project start is February/March.

·             Herb, Matt, will talk with Larry Fradkin concerning procedural issues to speed up the CRADA process and deal with EPA involvement in the CRADA.

·             Presentation at the conference in Austin will most likely be a “methods” paper as opposed to “results”.

NEMI Presentation

·             Larry gave a brief overview of NEMI and the plan for developing NEMI.

·             Bob Hirsch and Elizabeth Fellows complimented Boards’ efforts.  The Board expressed appreciation that resources were made available to initiate work on NEMI.

·             Jim Hanlon expressed support for the project and suggested that those methods currently approved for compliance monitoring be designated as such.  The Board concurred.

·             On-going support for NEMI maintenance still needs to be procured.

Bob Hirsch Presentation

·             USGS still budgeted for Clean Water Action Plan for FY2000 and preliminary prospects look reasonable for FY2001.

·             Supported the importance of methods in water monitoring citing NAWQA, emerging contaminants (e.g., in relation to Confined Animal Feed Operations), pathogens, radionucleiides, and naturally occurring toxic metals.

Bill Wilbur Presentation

·             Presented lessons learned from 10 years of NAWQA studies.  Recognized importance of planning and an evolving plan as the situation demands; study design and methods protocols need to be clearly defined and communicated; QA/QC is essential but often underfunded or minimized; database design needs to be thought out early in the process for data extraction and interpretation later; lab analyses should consider potential long-term uses of the data as well as short-term uses; more time for data interpretation is as or more important than collection of more data.  A single laboratory for dealing with all analyses was superior to dealing with multiple laboratories; clear, meaningful presentation of findings is critical.  Communication is likewise a critical aspect, but often, grossly underestimated in terms of cost and effort.

·             Presented efforts and analyses conducted by USGS to decide how to scale back the number of NAWQA sites in future monitoring.  Starting FY2000 there will be 42 study units, plus high plains study unit, as opposed to 60 originally.

Drinking Water Initiative

·             Glenn Patterson reported on USGS-EPA interagency effort.  USGS is involved in: analytical method development; as a backup lab for the Information Collection Rule; collection and analysis of data for the EPAs unregulated contaminants rule as part of NAWQA monitoring; VOC’s in New England; support for Methods Board; analyzing/evaluating emerging contaminants; and radionuclide surveys.

NEMI Workgroup

·             Elane will be the outreach liaison - her first effort will be a 1 page fact sheet on the NEMI outreach strategy.

·             Discussed how to get NEMI accomplished - questions will be generated by Dan.  Larry will be the point of contact/coordinator for answers.  All information will be sent to Dan.  EMSD with field analytical methods has a slightly different structure and EMMI files have been sent to Dan.

·             Confirm business rules - use Nutrient methods and 9 other types of methods to determine problems that will exist.  Ruggedness is unclear still.  Quantitative capability index may be the first cut at this.

·             USGS will start right away; DynCorp will start in January.

·             Phase 1 demo - web database is more intuitive but less powerful than Developer with Oracle.  Will use web database as original demo.  Develop papers, articles, on what is being done, etc. but don’t give out the alpha version.

·             Need nutrients and bio info on fields for Phase 1 - send to Dan.  Radiochem fields may be the same, but business rules will be different.

·             Put Larry’s powerpoint presentation on public site.  Put Fact Sheet on website then publish.  Send to many free environmental newsletters.  Enclose copy of NEMI fact sheet with web link letter.  Provide Charlie/Abby with list of magazines and addresses for a Press Release.  Send Elane and rest of group a copy of Abby’s table. 

Nutrients Workgroup

·             Tetra Tech developed NEMI tables for a number of nutrient methods.  Needs to be reviewed by Board.

·             Tetra Tech is developing a preliminary data dictionary for nutrient methods.  This, along with more discussion could be the beginning of a nutrient methods “chapter” or paper.

·             Maybe useful to summarize NEMI efforts as a Fact Sheet for outreach purposes.

·             Consider a nutrient pilot for addressing comparability of sampling and analysis methods with respect to DQOs.

·             Tetra Tech is evaluating current approaches to nutrient criteria and TMDLs and will link with NEMI method characteristics to develop a DQO/MQO approach for nutrient monitoring and methods.

·             Need to link with Adriana concerning NOAA nutrient pilot study underway.

Workgroup Integration Within the Board

Jerry presented a preliminary overview of integration ideas.

·             Public outreach of Board activities is critical to integration efforts and Board progress — need higher priority on articles, press releases, web site; NEMI Fact Sheet, PBMS paper.

·             Biology and Nutrient groups feeding NEMI and PBMS groups right now but don’t lose sight of Biology and Nutrient activities in their own right.

·             Produce NEMI/PBMS papers/tables being developed in Biology and Nutrients, as stand-alone products.

·             Accreditation group not duplicating NELAC — rather a link between NELAC and Board.

·             Each Workgroup needs representative on Outreach Workgroup.

        Workgroup Integration Discussion

·             NEMI needs to be an umbrella under which there is chemistry, biology, nutrients, and radiochemistry.

·             Need to find and evaluate case studies addressing method comparability.

·             Consider a methods and data comparability protocol/pilot — using an RFQ (request for quotation or capabilities) approach perhaps — define what is meant by comparability or how one can measure comparability.  The ICR may be a good model to show how to ensure comparable data.  Herb will share with the Board.

·             We need to address the process of demonstrating comparability: (a) define the problem, (b) illustrate the problem (e.g., Wisconsin Pilot?), (c) attempt to reconcile the problem (delineate steps necessary), (d) articulate problem solving efforts; (e) identify tools, concepts, components required to solve problem, and (f) compare required components for data comparison and identify future needs.

·             All workgroups should maintain their identity.  Need a chemistry subgroup so that there is an equal footing for each of the sets of constituents under NEMI and PBMS.

·             Potential Board workgroup model

Product Based Workgroups (smaller steering committees)

- NEMI architecture

- PBMS COD Pilot

- WQDE

- Accreditation Position Paper

- PT Evaluation

- Outreach

Constituent Based groups (NEMI/PBMS Umbrella currently), pilots and future development

- Bio subumbrella

- Microbiology

- Field Biology

- Toxicology

- Immunoassay

- Chemistry (Inorganic/Organic?)

- Nutrients

- Radiochemistry

Board Membership/Roster Rotation

See Excel spreadsheet on Board private Webpage.

Federal

D — Brass, EPA - 1 year more (co-chair)

D — Peters, USGS - 1 year acting co-chair

D — Strong - retire in March/April - need to replace, she will help find a COE replacement

D — Adrianna, NOAA - has one more year

D — Keith McLaughlin - replace with DOE representative (Mary Verwolf?)

A — Nissan, Navy

A — Henderson, CDC - replace with someone from the agency with more of a public health

  perspective

A — McChesney, EPA, Region 2

A — Shockey, USGS

A — Hankin, NRCS - replace with (see email for name)

State

D — Santoro, DRBC- reup 2 more years

D — Miller, WDNR - 1 more year

D — Simmons, CA new - 3 years?

D — Ayers, VaDEQ - 1 more

D — Alben, NYDH - 1 more

A — need 5, include a tribal representative — Dennis following up with Tribal representative,

Ausley, NC will be contacted by Herb, several public health possibilities.

Concern due to costs and need for travel support.  Travel for delegates is a must.  We need to try and extend support to state/tribal alternates as well.  Funding constraints will likely prohibit support for all 10 state/tribal Delegates and Alternates but perhaps funding could be available for a total of six or seven Alternates/Delegates for 4 meetings next year ($25,000).  Consider a representative from TNRCC — Texas is pretty active in monitoring.

Private Sector

D — Keith, WPI - 3 years

D — Dunn, Hach - 3 years

D — Malo, ASTM - 1 more

D — Annis, Merck - reup for 2

D — Eaton/Greenberg, Std Methods - Andy 1 more year?

A — Henry, ASTM D - 19

A — Greenberg - replace with Parr Catalyst?

A — Saunders

A — Williams – beginning in mid 2000

A — Berger, EBMUD

CMA - Tom McAninch was designated as an alternate.  Will he still be able to stay involved?

Rest of participants are workgroup members.  Charlie needs to update that table.

Contact Barry Long about a Park Service Representative.  Need to formally recognize delegates that are moving off the Board — Bob Berger, Barbara Erickson, Bob Carlson.

National Conference, Austin, April 2000

·             Board sessions and workshops were discussed.

·             Conference structure: 6 goal groups - 3 sessions and a 90-minute discussions session.  Also 6 workshops.  Last day is report backs from discussions and a field trip.  There are also about 75 posters.  Need to work on slide show, display, handouts, information packet, and updated fact sheets for that handout package.  Outreach workgroup should have a conference call to discuss upcoming activities and schedules.

Board Business

·             Revise and send action items table out.

·             There will be Executive Summary minutes for Board and public distribution from now on.  Separate Workgroup minutes will still be produced as well for the private Board page.

·             Roster needs to be updated and sent out.

·             Web site needs updating as soon as practical.

·             Prepare job descriptions for tasks needed to be done — volunteers wanted.  Make sure we don’t duplicate what others are doing (e.g., ASTM, Std Method, NELAC).

·             Conference calls  -  Board 1/26/00, Steering Comm – 1/24/00

­   outreach call — contact Rick or Charlie

·             Next Board meeting in Sacramento - March 21, 22, 23 - T, W, Thu.

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