TO THE UTTER DEPTHS OF CORRUPTION AND BEYOND?

O.K. first off that title is an exaggeration. I expect that this latest psuedo/junk science from CRA/GHD firstly is not illegal as much as immoral or unethical or at the very least sketchy. Secondly I also doubt that it's anywhere near the worst that they have done. I've been doing some on-line research and so far it appears to me that they have simply borrowed a methodology that may indeed serve its intended purpose which is to reduce laboratory costs for specified environmental investigations. It's the specifics of course which are the problem. Put another way, the devil is in the details.

In the reports that I've found since I went looking yesterday it seems as if there are particular instances where the methodology of composite sampling is accepted, albeit with some skepticism and with a number of conditions. Composite sampling is what GHD have been doing over the last few years regarding revelations raised in 2014 by the Chemtura Public Advisory Committee (CPAC), now known as the Citizens Public Advisory Committee (CPAC). Instead of for example taking half a dozen discrete soil samples say ten metres apart and testing all six for DDT and Dioxins/Furans; our intrepid consultants and savers of the polluters funds, takes these six samples and mixes them together, extracts one homogenized sample and simply tests the one sample. This presumably reduces lab costs to 1/6 of what they would otherwise be. Yes you are giving up valuable information such as where exactly are the highest concentrations (ie. "hot spots") but if your goal is more about reduced costs than greater knowledge and accuracy in characterizing contaminant concentrations, then voila!

Secondly there may very well be other benefits to misusing this methodology. David Hofbauer, one of the more technically advanced if not the only technically advanced TAG (Technical Advisory Group) member, stated at a past public TAG meeting that composite soil sampling is a method of averaging high concentrations of contaminants with low concentrations and thus hiding the higher concentrations from sight. This indeed is what has been done with the totally pathetic two composite soil samples taken in the "Gap" area of the Lanxess and Stroh property. The location of at least one of those two composite soil samples known as SS-20 and SS-21 is beyond ridiculous and I have to assume is not incompetence but was done intentionally. Shame on GHD and shame on lanxess for permitting it unless of course Lanxess really don't know the scam that has been pulled. If they don't now then they will on Thursday provided Ramin Ansari doesn't get cold feet and renege on his written offer to me to speak publicly together in Woolwich Council Chambers after the formal TAG meeting.