Beneficial Uses of Great Lakes Dredged Material: A Report of the Great Lakes Beneficial Use Task Force: Fid-Bau Portal

Beneficial Uses of Great Lakes Dredged Material: A Report of the Great Lakes Beneficial Use Task Force

The need to find and advance beneficial use alternatives to conventional dredged material management–alternatives to open water disposal and placement in a Confined Disposal Facility (CDF)–has been a topic of increasing importance to state, federal and local stakeholders. This need stems not only from diminishing CDF capacity and decreasing acceptance of indiscriminate open water disposal, but also from an emerging philosophy that, where possible, reuse and recycling of dredged material should take priority over disposal. The beneficial use of dredged material that is not contaminated or only mildly contaminated can allow CDF capacity to be reserved for the most contaminated dredged material. This can extend the life of Great Lakes CDFs where capacity is diminishing. New CDFs are costly to build and can be difficult to site. From an environmental standpoint, technological and regulatory developments to reduce/eliminate contamination or exposure to contamination has made beneficial use imperative. With proper testing and government guidelines that protect human health and the environment, beneficial use of dredged material offers a sustainable long-term management option for dredged material in the Great Lakes basin. However, numerous regulatory, financial and public perception issues continue to be major obstacles to beneficial use.