A fact sheet is a one-page presentation of a currently funded DOER research unit. It is used to present the following information: (1) problem; (2) study description; (3) products; and (4) summary.
Focus Area: Dredged Material Management
Focus Area Leader: Brian McFall, Research Civil Engineer, Coastal Hydraulics Laboratory
Title: Enhancing Confined Disposal Facilities Operation to Support Coastal Resiliency
POC: Brian Harris and Justin Shawler
Summary: The USACE currently seeks to beneficially use 70% of dredged material by 2030 but contaminated sediment still relies on placement in CDFs. This project supports restoring CDF capacity for contaminated sediment by co-developing with districts guidance for characterizing, extracting, and beneficially re-using clean sediment.
Focus Area: Dredged Material Management
Title: Dredge Sediment Placement For Phytoremediation and Upland Placement Site Restoration
POC: Mark L. Ballentine
Summary: A detailed method and understanding of the potential for upland plant phytoremediation and upland replacement using dredge sediment will guide future beneficial use of dredge sediment to meet USACE beneficial use goals. This research topic will explore, develop optimal methods, and guide the use of dredge sediments for the 3D printing designs for upland field placement for phytoremediation of contaminants. The research topic will increase USACE understanding of potential new ways of beneficially using dredge sediment for contaminant remediation and site restoration.
Focus Area: Dredged Material Management
Title: Analysis of Nourishment Hazards Using Beach Lifeguard Data
POC: Sean P. McGill
Summary: This research will look at the impacts of a 2019 beach nourishment project on beach patron safety by using lifeguard daily logs. The results of this work will help District’s better understand the relationship between nourishments and surf zone hazards.
Focus Area: Dredged Material Management
Title: Beneficial Use Comprehensive Benefits Tool
POC: Burton Suedel
Summary: This project will address the USACE 70/30 beneficial use goal by providing systematic, large-scale opportunities for beneficial use of dredged material. Simultaneously, this project will support the USACE navigation mission. The BU Comprehensive Benefits Tool will provide methods for sediment placement alternative analysis that satisfies the needs of EM 1110-2-5025 and Sec. 125. The BUCBT will take a qualitative approach to fit the fast pace of dredging planning and execution. The BUCBT serves to provide evidence for the benefits of potential increased costs associated with beneficial use alternatives. As part of the development process, since January 2023 as funded by the DOTS program, the BUCBT (originally developed in spreadsheet form) has been incrementally improved in response to valuable input by HQ and MSCs.
Focus Area: Dredged Material Management
Title: Decision Support for Managers Restoring Texas Marshes with BUDM
POC: Brian Harris
Summary: The USACE currently seeks to beneficially use 70% of dredged material by 2030 and a primary tactic to achieve this is via thin layer placement however much remains unknown about the long-term ecological stability and function of these sites. The USACE-ERDC is partnering with USGS, DU, USFWS, and TPWD to develop a Texas BUDM Master Plan. The overarching objective of this effort is to inform wetland restoration efforts that will reduce threats of sea-level rise and extreme storm events to coastal marshes.
Focus Area: Dredged Material Management
Title: Rapid Tools for Nearshore Placement of Dredged Material
POC: Brian McFall and Doug Krafft
Summary: By developing rapid tools to predict whether dredged sediment placed in the nearshore will be active and how the shoreline will respond, this project will improve the enterprise’s ability to rapidly scope nearshore placement alternatives for dredged sediment on the open coast, and support the USACE goal to beneficially using 70% of dredged sediment by 2030.
Focus Area: Dredged Material Management
Title: Improved BUDM Laboratory Methods for Low Stress Consolidation and Erodibility
POC: Jack Cadigan
Summary: The USCAE is improving sediment characterization methodology as part of a larger effort to increase the beneficial use of dredged sediment across the nation. This project is developing a technique to characterize cohesive sediment consolidation and erodibility properties to better understand placed sediment from deposition to long-term behavior.
Focus Area: Dredged Material Management
Title: Monitoring Wetland Surface Elevation Post Beneficial Use via Remote Sensing
POC: Brian Harris
Summary: The USACE Districts require a cost effective method to monitor the placement of beneficial use dredged sediment in back-bay environments. However, traditional use of terrestrial and satellite methods do not provide sufficient spatial or temporal resolution. A field demonstration of two drone-based remote sensing techniques (e.g., photogrammetry and LiDAR) will be conducted during an upcoming BU project in NJ to determine if they are feasible for implementation in future projects.
Focus Area: Dredged Material Management
Title: Beneficial Use Innovation for Dredged Material
POC: Alan Kennedy
Summary: The aim of this effort is to further the enterprise-wide beneficial use of dredged material by identifying it as a resource for sustainable, nature-based, cost-effective solution for managing our navigation channels and waterways, while fostering strong partnerships, collaborations, and relationships with stakeholders and agencies.
Products:
Dredge Technology Innovation (11 Oct 2023 presentation)
Storyboard
Technical Note: Hurdles to beneficial use of dredged material: root cause analysis
Focus Area: Dredged Material Management
Focus Area: Innovation in Sediment Management - Innovative Construction and Operations Technologies
Focus Area Leader: Brian McFall, Research Civil Engineer, Coastal Hydraulics Laboratory
Title: Attrition of Mud Aggregates through Dredge Pipelines for Beneficial Use Projects
POC: Anthony Priestas, David Perkey, Jarrell Smith , and Danielle Tarpley
Summary: Understanding aggregate durability and attrition behavior though hydraulic pipelines will facilitate the selection of the most appropriate use cases for dredged FGS and optimize operational planning. This knowledge will be realized through the use of a predictive tool to anticipate changes in the size of mud aggregates based on sediment characteristics and transport distance. Ultimately, this RT shows promise to improve construction planning and ensure resource-efficient dredging operations.
Focus Area: Innovation in Sediment Management - Innovative Construction and Operations Technologies
Title: Innovative Rapid Riverine Shoal Removal Technology RT24-17
POC: Andrew Collins and David Yearwood
Summary: The USACE is seeking ways to efficiently maintain riverine channels. This project is developing a system to dredge shoaling areas by combining barge technologies and water injection dredging practices. This system could significantly reduce costs associated with dredging operations as well as reduce the total carbon footprint required to maintain navigation channels.
Focus Area: Innovation in Sediment Management - Innovative Construction and Operations Technologies
Title: Development of Dredge Outfall Seeding Method for Rapid Establishment of BU Projects
POC: Jack Cadigan
Summary: Recently placed Dredged Sediments used for Beneficial Use purposes in Coastal, Marsh, and Riverine settings can be subject to flooding/wave wash/and high velocity flows that risk washing away these soils. Mixing select rapid growth seed variations into the dredged slurry at the time of placement could help stabilize the dredged sediment sooner, as well as reduce costs from direct plantings. CHL/CRREL will look to identify rapidly germinating seeds with strong root systems that are native and/or can be overtaken by native species. This proposed work will identify which plant species are best suited for thin layer placement by examining the thresholds (velocities) that these seeds can withstand in slurry, along with dredging velocity outputs for various sized dredges to determine the optimal dredge size/production needed to maintain O&M needs while being able to deliver seeds to marsh.
Innovation in Sediment Management - Innovative Construction and Operations Technologies
Title: Innovative Placement Techniques and Sediment Monitoring
POC: Brian McFall and Doug Krafft
Summary: The public often prefers for dredged sediment to be placed on the subaerial beach where it can be visually observed. The cross-shore swash zone (CSSZ) placement technique is a cost effective placement technique where the dredge’s discharge pipe is placed in the swash zone and slowly maneuvered away from the land to create a shoreline perpendicular spit. Chicago District (LRC) has an opportunity to build a CSSZ placement at the National Park Service’s Portage Lakefront & Riverwalk, which provides a unique monitoring opportunity to study the construction technique and the morphological evolution of the placement.
Focus Area: Innovation in Sediment Management - Innovative Construction and Operations Technologies
Title: Innovative Engineering with Nature (EWN) Construction Techniques
POC: Susan Bailey
Summary: A range of unique construction techniques are needed to perform EWN projects. This project will provide insight as to the current state of the science regarding EWN construction techniques and will inform future research needs. Information will also be provided as to how dredged material consolidation impacts EWN construction.
Focus Area: Innovation in Sediment Management - Innovative Construction and Operations Technologies
Title: Autonomous Dredging in USACE
POC: Brandan Scully
Summary: The dredging industry has identified autonomous dredging as a near-term possibility. USACE has the opportunity to identify where this emerging technology fits within its current dredging practice. This effort will distill the opinions of USACE experts across a range of dredging related disciplines into a whitepaper outlining the opportunities and obstacles anticipated for USACE to implement autonomous dredging into its future dredging practice.
Focus Area: Innovation in Sediment Management - Innovative Construction and Operations Technologies
Title: Evaluating Bedload Sediment Collectors to By-Pass Shoaling Sediment
POC: Chuck Theiling
Summary: This research will evaluate the effectiveness of bedload sediment collector by-pass systems which may be an alternative to replace dredging and keep sediment in transport where river current velocity alone is insufficient. This research could lead to significant changes and cost savings for riverine channel management, and it is applicable in coastal settings too.
Products:
Video: Lake Altoona sees latest in U.S. Army Corps of Engineers sediment collecting testing
Focus Area: Innovation in Sediment Management - Innovative Construction and Operations Technologies
Title: Innovative Dredging Technologies – Water Injection Dredging
POC: Zachary Tyler
Summary: Reservoirs and dams with fluidizable and slow settling sediments that may be transported by density current to outlet works may find water injection dredging an applicable sediment management strategy.
Focus Area: Innovation in Sediment Management - Innovative Construction and Operations Technologies and Practices
Focus Area: Risk Management
Focus Area Leader: David Moore, Research Biologist, Environmental Laboratory
POC: Gui Lotufo
Summary: The goal of the project is the selection of an appropriate new test species for sediment bioaccumulation tests that can be field-collected year-round, harbors minimal background whole-body contamination, and meets test species requirements described in guidance documents. We will conduct a side-by-side comparison study with Macoma nasuta and the purple varnish clam (Nuttallia obscurata), which occurs in the Pacific Northwest. Reduced reliance on a species with limited availability will reduce likelihood of costly project delays. The scientifically validated use of alternate marine clam species that may be utilized with confidence will benefit all Corps districts that conduct coastal navigation dredging.
Focus Area: Risk Management
Title: Food Web-Based Computational Tool to Estimate PFAS Risk to Human Health
POC: Kurt Gust
Summary: The food-web model developed to estimate the human health risk associated with PFAS contamination in dredged sediments will directly support the Great Lakes region by providing quantitative risk characterization tool to support risk-management decisions for dredged material placement in aquatic environments, including BUDM applications. Access to high quality science-based risk characterization information for dredged sediments will greatly increase the frequency in which decision makers can confidently choose to use dredged materials as BUDM when, otherwise, only a precautionary principle may be available, given existing uncertainties surrounding PFAS health risk. Consequently, the USACE goal of applying 70% of dredged sediment in BUDM applications is more likely to be met while simultaneously establishing improved environmental stewardship and human health protection.
Focus Area: Risk Management
Title: In Situ BU of Contaminated Sediments: Leveraging Dredged Sediment for Enhancing Aquatic Habitats
POC: Burton Suedel
Summary: This project will address the USACE 70/30 beneficial use goal by providing systematic, large-scale opportunities for beneficial use of dredged material. Simultaneously, this project will support aquatic ecosystem restoration and navigation missions. Of note is that many sediment remediation projects are located near urban areas where aquatic and wetland habitat is scarce, and dredging is imperative for maintaining harbor functions. Marrying habitat restoration with dredged material will help support both these USACE missions. Identifying and demonstrating in-water BU will help support cost effective dredged material management. This project will support ecosystem restoration while building relationships and opportunities across agencies, which will in turn expand future options for interagency collaborations and beneficial use.
Focus Area: Risk Management
Title: Development of “Fish-on-a-Chip” for Evaluation of Toxicity of Elutriates from Dredged Materials
POC: Keri Donohue
Summary: Water column toxicity testing of elutriates from dredged materials is a necessary but expensive step for the evaluation of dredged materials for determination of suitability for unrestricted open water disposal or aquatic beneficial use of the material. The goal of this proof-of-concept study will be to provide the evidence for the use of a “fish-on-a-chip” system for high-throughput screening of dredged materials that could ultimately reduce the number live vertebrate test animals and lower the costs associated with water column toxicity testing for dredged materials.
Focus Area: Risk Management
Title: Sequestering Dredge Material Contaminants for Beneficial Use Applications in 3D Printed Structures
POC: Mark Ballentine
Summary: A detailed method and understanding of dredge material in 3D printing will guide future beneficial use of dredge material to meet USACE beneficial use goals. This research topic will develop optimal methods for 3D printing dredged materials and explore the leaching potential from contaminated dredge materials. For dredge materials that do have leachates, additives will be studied to determine best practice types to sequester leachate contaminants. The research topic will increase USACE understanding of potential new avenues of beneficial use for dredge material.
Products:
Video: Sequestering Dredged Sediment Contaminants for Beneficial Use Applications in 3D-Printed Structures
Focus Area: Risk Management
Title: Next Generation Dredged Material Evaluation: Bioaccumulation on a Chip
POC: Gui Lotufo
Summary: Bioaccumulation testing is the costliest and most time-consuming component of the required testing conducted for the assessment of dredged material. The proposed effort will establish robust approaches for bioaccumulation screening using polymer samplers and related devices for bioaccumulation CoCs. We will develop clear decision guidance that will indicate when bioaccumulation testing would be unnecessary and therefore accomplish substantial cost saving.
Focus Area: Risk Management
Title: Understanding Field Performance of Amendments as a Function of the Application
POC: Susan Bailey
Summary: The results of laboratory evaluation in combination with modeling will provide guidance to users to balance dosage needs with mixing and placement options to achieve the required performance of amendments over time and to develop realistic expectations for monitoring. Results will promote Engineering With Nature® projects, help meet USACE BU goals and reduce placement costs where open water placement would be restricted.
Focus Area: Risk Management
Title: Next Gen Dredging/Water Quality Evaluation, Monitoring and Sensing for Risk Management
POC: Alan Kennedy
Summary: The result of this effort is a compelling, data-based argument that more robust monitoring automation with operational adjustments can supersede imprudent, repeated full re-evaluations at taxpayer’s expense. This effort defines a strategic roadmap to improve value of current and future sediment and water quality monitoring and management decisions directly of value to the USACE dredging and sustainability missions. This effort projects significant modernization in the data interpretation, analysis and collection approaches through faster and cheaper monitoring and sensors. USACE would realize cost savings by reducing: (1) imprudent evaluations; (2) dredging monitoring in low-risk areas; and (3) collection of irrelevant data not used for management decisions. The result will be increased understanding of current motivation for, and purpose of USACE water/sediment quality monitoring and a path to improve the relevancy and quality of the data collected to facilitate near-real time visualization and better-informed risk management decisions during dredging.
Focus Area: Risk Management
Title: Development of Regional Background Levels for Sediment Associated PFAS in the Great Lakes
POC: Gui Lotufo
Summary: Per and polyfluorinated alkylated substances (PFAS) are a ubiquitous class of emerging contaminants of concern known to cause human health effects with exceedingly low environmental screening or regulatory levels. Given the ubiquity of PFAS, near certainty of their presence in sediments and increasingly stringent regulatory levels, a key critical first step will be the development of a basis for contextual understanding of sediment associated concentrations of PFAS. We propose to derive regional background concentrations for sediment associated PFAS using data from recent sediment surveys along with data from sediment samples to be collected for this project in proximity to USACE managed federal navigation channels throughout the Great Lakes. Sediment PFAS concentrations will also be used to develop or model regional background values for sediment elutriates.
Focus Area: Risk Management
POC: Alan Kennedy
Summary: A customizable, fit-for-purpose monitoring technology resulting from this research will provide insight to down-select DM sites potentially needing remediation measures versus areas where CoC bioavailability is of lesser concern. We will expand low-cost 3D printing technology to be amenable to on-site, on-vessel, on-demand materials for remediation (adsorption, destruction) and monitoring to down select and reduce cost of analyzing traditional and emerging contaminants of concern and field deploy the technology to address scalability. USACE would realize cost savings by reducing: (1) imprudent evaluations; or (2) dredging to remove low risk materials.
Products:
Video: Materials fabrication and dredging assessment scenarios using low-cost 3D printing applications
Focus Area: Risk Management
Focus Area: Environmental Resource Management
Focus Area Leader: Todd Swannack, Ph.D., Research Biologist, Environmental Laboratory
Title: Quantifying placement impacts to sensitive and T&E species
POC: Safra Altman, Matt Balazik, and Ben Emery
Summary: The main objectives of this research task are to provide empirical data on the impacts, or lack thereof, of in-water placement on selected sensitive and T&E Species and to provide those data to USACE districts to help alleviate concern by resource managers.
Focus Area: Environmental Resource Management
Title: Characterization of Biological Effects of Open Water Placement Sites
POC: Karen Keil
Summary: This research will be conducting by collecting multiple lines of evidence, including
If positive long-term environmental effects are identified in association with traditional open water placement of dredged sediment, the management of dredged sediment will become more cost effective and efficient. Moreover, this would provide a scientifically sound basis to inform and optimize the management of dredged sediment at open water sites to further enhance and benefit the aquatic ecosystem.
Focus Area: Environmental Resource Management
Title: Testing Tickler Chain Efficacy for Reduction in Endangered Species Takes
POC: Matt Balazik and Ben Emery
Summary: Both the dredge industry and USACE are interested in having TCs replace the draghead deflectors currently used on USACE projects. There is currently no knowledge on whether TC arrays are an effective means of protecting species of concern, mainly sea turtles, from entrainment by dragheads. Taking a proactive approach by increasing our knowledge of how species of concern react when they encounter TCs will help USACE efforts to change current deflectors with TC on dredge projects. If TC arrays do replace draghead deflectors, all of USACE will benefit from increased production rates and decreased fuel and carbon footprint.
Focus Area: Environmental Resource Management
POC: Todd Swannack
Summary: The objectives of this research task will be to quantify the engineering and environmental benefits of the USACE dredge placement area network. This effort will provide USACE operations managers with a quantitative tool to optimize the location of a new DPA to maximize its benefits within the broader DPA and landscape networks.
Focus Area: Environmental Resource Management
Title: Threatened and Endangered Species Team (TEST)
POC: Rich Fischer
Summary: The Threatened and Endangered Species Team exists to streamline Section 7 consultations, reduce costs, and minimize TES impacts to USACE missions. The TEST accelerates the development of solutions for priority TES issues that will improve budget planning capabilities and operational flexibility to reduce future costs and adverse impacts to USACE mission execution.
Focus Area: Environmental Resource Management
Focus Area: Sediment and Dredging Processes
Focus Area Leader: Duncan Bryant, Research Hydraulic Engineer, Coastal Hydraulics Laboratory
Title: Characterization of the Spread of Fine-Grained Sediment for Beneficial Use of Dredge Material
POC: David Perkey
Summary: The purpose of this effort is to further the knowledge of FGS placement for BU practices by conducting both a laboratory- and field-based study. The findings of this study will be utilized in the development of a dispersion calculator and guidelines for the placement of FGS for BU. The effort will include the collaboration of multiple districts.
Focus Area: Sediment and Dredging Processes
Title: Strategic Placement at Marsh Edge as Sediment Source to Marsh Interior
POC: Jarrell Smith
Summary: To expand beneficial use of fine-grained dredged sediment, the USACE must develop innovative and cost-effective practices for strategic placement near coastal marshes. Strategic placement near the marsh edge is one such cost effective measure. This project develops observational and modeling approaches to define conditions under which strategic placement at the marsh edge can deliver sediment deep into marsh interiors without the expensive and often intrusive practice of direct placement onto the marsh surface.
Focus Area: Sediment and Dredging Processes
Title: Improving Aquatic Placement Practices for Beneficial Use of Dredged Material in the Great Lakes
POC: Karen Keil
Summary: This research would aid USACE by removing the ambiguity and uncertainty regarding nearshore placement opportunities and approaches in freshwater systems. It would complement and build upon recently completed USACE-ERDC research exploring nearshore placement techniques. By leveraging prior Great Lakes ecosystem restoration projects and supporting future projects, the outcomes of this research task would have wide-reaching benefits not only to the USACE but also numerous state and federal resource management agencies and stakeholders.
Focus Area: Sediment and Dredging Processes
Title: Riverine Aquatic Placement Beneficial Use Guidance
POC: Burton Suedel
Summary: Beneficial use guidance for riverine features built with dredged sediment simultaneously supports USACE Navigation and Ecosystem Restoration business lines by developing sustainable dredged sediment management practices which re-introduce complex morphology to rivers that will support improved bank stabilization, enhance channel stability, and increase habitat diversity. In-water placement may be more sustainable but can also be accomplished at reduced cost relative to alternatives that remove the sediment from the aquatic system and otherwise restrict the benefits that can be achieved through sediment beneficial use practices that engineer with nature.
Focus Area: Sediment and Dredging Processes
Title: Dredged Material Placement Models for Complex Aquatic Environments
POC: Tahirih Lackey
Summary: A comprehensive modeling interface and systematic method of training and technical transfer for the dredging placement models will be developed. This modeling interface will replace the previously outdated interface for DIFCD with both a desktop and webapp and create a webapp for STFATE. In addition, model documentation, workshop materials, and testcases will be developed and made available for users.
Focus Area: Sediment and Dredging Processes
Focus Area: Public Private Partnership: Innovative Technologies for Managing / Treating Contaminated Sediment to Expand Beneficial Use Opportunities
Focus Area Leader: David Moore, Ph.D., Senior Research Biologist, Environmental Laboratory
Title: Sediment Bacteria Mining for Beneficial Reuse
Technical Project Lead: Clara Austin, AECOM
PPP Program Lead: David Moore, ERDC-EL
Summary: The purpose of the study is experimental and designed to be a proof-of-concept determination on whether bacteria residing in contaminated sediments can also adapt in plant tissues as inoculants or endophytes to enhance breakdown of contaminants using the application of phytoremediation.
Products:
Storyboard
Focus Area: Treatment of Contaminated Sediment to Facilitate Beneficial Use
Technical Project Lead: Dr. Ram Mohan, Anchor QEA
PPP Program Lead: David Moore, ERDC-EL
Summary: The aim of this study is to foster consideration of BU of CDM as part of national legacy contaminated site remediation projects via close coordination between USACE and USEPA along with other key stakeholders. Study products will be used to document technology effectiveness and utility.
Products:
Storyboard
Focus Area: Treatment of Contaminated Sediment to Facilitate Beneficial Use
Title: Repurposing CDFs for Contaminated Sediments. A Win-Win for Beneficial Use
Technical Project Lead: Staci Goetz, Ramboll
PPP Program Lead: David Moore, ERDC-EL
Summary: This project will perform an LCA that includes a Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA), for select Detroit District CDFs as a model for value creation through beneficial sediment use from CDFs, and using remaining or created CDF capacity for permanent contaminated-sediment disposal. When filled, CDFs with contaminated sediment can be capped and used beneficially as newly created uplands. Combined, the beneficial use of CDF sediment, repurposing CDFs for contaminated sediment, and beneficial use of contaminated sediment through new land creation are inherently circular and sustainable.
Products:
Storyboard
Poster: Increasing Sustainable Beneficial Use Opportunities Working With Contaminated Sediment
Focus Area: Treatment of Contaminated Sediment to Facilitate Beneficial Use
Title: Laboratory scale evaluation of combining AOP with sediment stabilization for beneficial use.
Technical Project Lead: Balaji Rao, Texas Tech University
PPP Program Lead: David Moore, ERDC-EL
Summary: There is a growing need to find solutions that address removal of contaminants from sediments to enable beneficial use. A series of laboratory studies will be conducted to assess the efficacy of AOP based sediment treatment followed by sediment stabilization using binders. The results from this study are expected to provide additional options for ex-situ-based sediment management.
Products:
Storyboard
Focus Area: Treatment of Contaminated Sediment to Facilitate Beneficial Use