CRESP III Mission

The mission of CRESP III is to advance cost-effective, risk-based cleanup of the nation's nuclear weapons production facility sites and cost effective, risk-based management of potential future nuclear sites and wastes. This will be accomplished by seeking to improve the scientific and technical basis for environmental management decisions by the Department of Energy and by fostering public participation in that search.

Scope

The CRESP III project will help define and assess the technical and regulatory scope and approaches useful for the Department as it strives to undertake its cleanup and stewardship responsibilities in a protective and cost-effective manner at contaminated sites, and plan and manage potential future nuclear sites and wastes. The project effort will focus on supporting independent and collaborative research, reviews, methods, data gathering and stakeholder participation needed for effective evaluation and communication of DOE related health, environmental and other risks. The project will focus responsively on important cleanup-related challenges at the sites and on the end states which cleanups seek to achieve, and planning and management challenges for potential future nuclear sites and wastes. The project effort will accomplish the outcomes by:

• performing targeted studies on specific risk related issues important to the longterm management of environmental problems;
• contributing to risk evaluation and assessment, or to the development of related methodologies, relevant to' risk issues at a number of DOE sites;
• focusing on the collection and analysis of data needed for effective risk evaluation, and on the definition and assessment of relevant technical and regulatory approaches valuable in resolving risk-related issues;
• providing an independent mechanism to support the assessment of DOE'S needs for research, to critique cunent research, and to develop data relevant to the concerns of the public, to support planning and to be responsive to evolving regulatory commitments; and
• supporting efforts to improve working relationships and communications with the public and stakeholders at sites and across the DOE complex.