Report on the biological monitoring program at Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant, January--December 1997

On September 24, 1987, the Commonwealth of Kentucky Natural Resources and Environmental Protection Cabinet issued an Agreed Order that required the development of a Biological Monitoring Program (BMP) for the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant (PGDP). A plan for the biological monitoring of the receiving streams was implemented in 1987 and consisted of ecological surveys, toxicity monitoring of effluents and receiving streams, evaluation of bioaccumulation of trace contaminants in biota, and supplemental chemical characterization of effluents. Beginning in fall 1991, the Environmental Sciences Division (ESD) at Oak Ridge National Laboratory added data collection and report preparation to its responsibilities for the PGDP BMP. The BMP has been continued because it has proven to be extremely valuable in (1) identifying those effluents with the potential for adversely affecting instream fauna, (2) assessing the ecological health of receiving streams, and (3) guiding plans for remediation and protecting human health. The BMP for PGDP consists of three major tasks: (1) effluent toxicity monitoring, (2) bioaccumulation studies, and (3) ecological surveys of benthic macroinvertebrate communities and fish. With the exception of the benthic macroinvertebrate community surveys, this report focuses on activities from January to December 1997.