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ECONOMICS OF SAMPLE COMPOSITING AS A SCREENING TOOL IN GROUND WATER QUALITY MONITORING
Citation:
Rajagopal, R. AND L. Williams. ECONOMICS OF SAMPLE COMPOSITING AS A SCREENING TOOL IN GROUND WATER QUALITY MONITORING. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, D.C., EPA/600/J-89/044 (NTIS PB89197453), 1989.
Description:
Recent advances in high throughput/automated compositing with robotics/field-screening methods offer seldom-tapped opportunities for achieving cost-reduction in ground water quality monitoring programs. n economic framework is presented in this paper for the evaluation of sample compositing as a screening tool in ground water quality monitoring. hen the likelihood of occurence of a contaminant in a well is very small, the use of sample compositing instead of routine exhaustive sampling will lead 'to reduction in analytical efforts. uch reduction will be maximum when there are no contaminated wells in the network. An N-fold reduction will result when none of the wells in a network of N wells are contaminated. hen 25 percent or more wells in a network are contaminated, the use of sample compositing will require, at the most, an additional 5O percent analytical effort compared to exhaustive sampling. uantitative ratio (fl) of laboratory analytical cost to that of well installation and field sampling costs and a ratio (f2) of the expected number of contaminated wells to that of the total number of wells in the network. everal useful mathematical results of primary interest are derived and illustrated with case examples in the paper. elected areas for further research are also outlined.