ObjectivesThe broad goal of this research is to accelerate informed decision-making about contaminated sediment remediation in the Great Lakes. The research will be directly applicable to the remedial action plans (RAPs) prepared for each Great Lakes Area of Concern (AOC) and to the lake wide management plans (LaMPs) prepared for each of the Great Lakes. The research has two subsidiary objectives: (1) to quantify the economic benefits of contaminant clean-up for communities adjacent to Great Lakes Areas of Concern (AOC) and (2) to educate the public and elected officials about the economic benefits of clean-up.

Methodology
This project will use economic benefit transfer techniques to extrapolate from the available benefit estimates for contaminated sites to AOCs for which intensive analyses have not been undertaken. The benefits transfer will involve the statistical estimation of a meta-value function followed by calibration of a benefits transfer function and calculation of benefits for out-of-sample AOCs. From this process of extrapolation, the project also will identify a defensible lower bound for the basin-wide economic benefits of AOC contaminant remediation.

Rationale
In the late 1980s, the International Joint Commission identified 31 Areas of Concern (AOC) in U.S. portions of the Great Lakes. The AOCs are the most intensely contaminated areas in the basin. The contaminants found in these sites account for a large share of the toxic materials that have migrated into the aquatic food webs. All have been studied and are the foci of remedial action plans. Some have been partially cleaned up. However, nearly two decades later, not a single U.S. AOC has been fully remediated and delisted (Great Lakes Commission, 2002).

One of the obstacles hampering further contaminant remediation at the U.S. AOCs is a lack of compelling economic information to evaluate and set priorities for clean-up. Cost estimates for clean-up are available and sobering – in excess of $7.4 billion for both wastewater treatment upgrades as well as contaminate remediation at a subset of the U.S. sites – but estimates of the countervailing economic benefits are few in number and localized in nature. Cost-benefit considerations are important drivers in environmental programs generally and in the legal authorities that guide the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in its program of harbor and channel maintenance. Science-based benefits information is needed to determine where and how much to invest in remediation.