Baseline study in environmental risk assessment : site-specific model development and application

Environmental risk assessment is one of the key tools in environmental engineering. This risk assessment can be qualitative or quantitative and it is based on preliminary studies i.e., baseline study for waste disposal sites. Even though the literature exists on baseline study in general, still there is a lack of guidance regarding development of a site-specific baseline study model for a waste disposal site. This study has two-fold aim, firstly, how to develop site-specific baseline study model for a selected dumping site, and secondly, how this site-specific baseline study can support the environmental engineering via mathematical risk estimation. Mahmood Booti Open Dumping Site (MBODS) is selected to demonstrate the development and application of site-specific baseline study model. This is followed by building a framework that shows how the output of the baseline study can lead to environmental engineering via mathematical risk estimation. The paper provides a mechanism of how to construct a bespoke baseline-study model that is readily useable, avoiding procurement of expensive computer software and yet smoothly connecting with the follow-on stages of the risk assessment. The work presented in this paper can be reproduced repeatedly to create site-specific baseline study models for risk assessment of other waste disposal sites in a cost-effective, consistent and cohesive manner.