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THE POTENTIAL FOR THE USE OF CANINES IN VAPOR INTRUSION INVESTIGATIONS
Citation:
BIRD, S. L. THE POTENTIAL FOR THE USE OF CANINES IN VAPOR INTRUSION INVESTIGATIONS. Presented at 18th Annual National Tanks Conference, Memphis, TN, March 20 - 22, 2006.
Impact/Purpose:
To assess quantitative and qualitative methodologies evaluation of vapor intrusion, including quantification of uncertainties, to be used in the decision making process.
Description:
Dogs have been used extensively in law enforcement and military applications to detect narcotics and explosives for over thirty years and in arson investigations to detect accelerants since they are much more accurate at discriminating between accelerants and by-products of combustion than are field volatile organic compound (VOC) detectors. Relatively few environmental applications, however, have taken advantage of this canine capability. Detection dogs have the potential to rapidly screen houses for vapor intrusion of a variety of VOCs from contaminated groundwater sources. Dogs can rapidly screen for the presence of a substance in indoor air and are also capable of moving towards the source of volatile materials. The primary learning objective of this presentation is to provide the audience member with an understanding of the potential and limitations of using dogs in vapor intrusion investigations. An operational demonstration of scent detection dogs will be included in the presentation.