Quality assurance and quality control practices encompass all aspects of the Surface Environmental Surveillance Project. Comprehensive quality assurance programs, which include various quality control practices and methods to verify data, are maintained to ensure data quality. The programs are implemented through quality assurance plans designed to meet requirements of the American National Standards Institute / American Society of Mechanical Engineers and DOE Orders. Quality assurance plans are maintained for all activities, and auditors verify conformance.

Quality control methods include, but are not limited to, replicate sampling and analysis, analysis of field blanks and blind reference standards, participation in interlaboratory crosscheck studies, and splitting samples with other laboratories. Sample collection and laboratory analyses are conducted using documented and approved procedures. When sample results are received, they are screened for anomalous values by comparing them to recent results and historical data.

More detailed information on the quality assurance and quality control practices of the Surface Environmental Surveillance Project is available in the 2005 Hanford Site Environmental Report .

For more information, contact:

Elwood Lepel
Battelle, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory,
902 Battelle Boulevard, MS P8-01
PO Box 999
Richland, WA 99352

Phone: (509) 376-3390
or   (509) 371-7078
FAX: (509) 372-0672

E:mail: ea.lepel@pnl.gov