Appendix A
Biographical Sketches of Committee Members
Peter B. Lederman, Chair, retired as executive director, Hazardous Substance Management Research Center, as executive director, Office of Intellectual Property, New Jersey Institute of Technology, and as vice-president, Roy Weston, Inc., where he also served as one of the leaders of the hazardous materials management practice. He continues to teach environmental management, policy, and site remediation and is active as a consultant in the area of hazardous materials management. He has a Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the University of Michigan. Dr. Lederman has over 50 years of broad experience in all facets of environmental management, control, and policy development; considerable experience in hazardous substance treatment and management; process design and development in the petrochemical industry; and over 18 years of experience as an educator. He has industrial experience as a process designer and managed the development of new processes through full-scale plant demonstrations. He is well known for his work as a professor in chemical process design. He led his company’s safety program in the early 1980s. Dr. Lederman is a registered professional engineer, a registered professional planner, a certified hazardous material manager, and a diplomate in environmental engineering. Dr. Lederman has also worked at the federal EPA as a laboratory director and at state levels, with particular emphasis on environmental policy. He is a national associate of the National Academies.
Robin L. Autenrieth, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at Texas A&M University, received a B.S. in biological sciences from the University of Maryland, an M.S. in civil and environmental engineering from Clarkson College of Technology, and a Ph.D. in civil and environmental engineering from Clarkson University. Dr. Autenrieth conducts research that connects engineering principles to the biological responses of environments exposed to damaging chemicals. Microbial biodegradation is one alternative to traditional remediation methods that rely on physically removing the contaminants or treating them on-site with neutralizing chemicals. Dr. Autenrieth’s research on biodegradation kinetics on nerve and blister agents, as well as explosives and petroleum products, is being used to develop models to predict risks associated with exposure.
Richard J. Ayen, retired, was director of technology for Waste Management, Inc. He also managed all aspects of Waste Management’s Clemson Technical Center, including treatability studies and technology demonstrations for the treatment of hazardous and radioactive waste. His previous experience includes 20 years at Stauffer Chemical Company, where he was manager of the Process Development Department at Stauffer’s Eastern Research Center. Dr. Ayen has published extensively in his fields of interest. He was a member of the NRC Committee on Review and Evaluation of Alternative Technologies for Demilitarization of Assembled Chemical Weapons (I and II) and was Chair of the NRC Committee on Review and Evaluation of International Technologies for the Destruction of Non-Stockpile Materiel. He received a Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the University of Illinois.
John D. Glass is a consultant on a wide range of environmental actions, including environmental assessments, hazardous waste management plans, site investigations, and feasibility studies. His clients include several federal agencies, heavy industry, and municipalities. Prior to this Mr. Glass served as an engineer in the U.S. Army, including assignments as a construction unit commander, district engineer, and later as chief of the U.S. Army’s Environmental Office. During his Army career, he gained extensive experience in environmental regulations and hazardous waste management and remediation and was involved in planning for and managing a wide variety of environmental issues and resolving field implementation problems at the Army level. Mr. Glass holds master’s degrees in civil engineering from Iowa State University, in management from Salve Regina University, and in strategic studies from the U.S. Naval War College. His publications include The Brownfields Redevelopment Initiative—An Update, with Brad Peebles.
Christine S. Grant is currently a professor of chemical engineering at North Carolina State University. She is a member and officer of several professional organizations, including the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, the National Society of Black Engineers, and the American Chemical Society. Dr. Grant’s research programs include an intelligent image sensing system for environmentally benign cleaning processes and environmentally benign CO2-based surfactant decontamination processes. Dr. Grant received her Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology.
Gary S. Groenewold is a staff scientist who has conducted research in surface chemistry, gas-phase chemistry, and secondary ion mass spectrometry at the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) since 1991. His research has focused on determining the speciation of adsorbed radioactive and toxic metals (U, Np, Pu, Am, Hg, Al, and Cu) and organic compounds (e.g., VX, G agents, HD, organophosphates, amines, and sulfides). Prior to this, Dr. Groenewold served 3 years in line management at the INL and as the technical leader of an environmental organic analysis group. Before coming to the INL, he worked in anticancer drug discovery for Bristol-Myers, using mass spectrometry as an identification tool. He received his Ph.D. in chemistry at the University of Nebraska, where he studied ion-molecule condensation and elimination reactions in the gas phase. He has authored 85 scientific publications on these subjects.
Rebecca A. Haffenden is an attorney and technical staff member of the Los Alamos National Laboratory. Prior to joining Los Alamos, she served as a program attorney with the Argonne National Laboratory. Her recent professional work has included serving as project manager for the Air Force Material Command (AFMC) Headquarters Environmental Compliance Assistance Program (ECAMP); work for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to evaluate legislation and regulations associated with security vulnerabilities; and providing legal expertise to programs involving federal facility site remediation and hazardous waste compliance and corrective actions (RCRA). She also coauthored a working paper on the application of federal and state hazardous waste regulatory programs to waste chemical agents, in addition to being a coauthor of the Environmental Impact Statement for the Assembled Chemical Weapons Alternates program. Ms. Haffenden received a B.A. in psychology from the University of Illinois and a J.D. degree from Suffolk Law School, in Boston.
Peter C. Hsu has 20 years of professional experience in research and development in weapons demilitarization technology; chemical engineering of secondary waste treatment processes; mixed waste treatment technologies; high explosives safety and performance properties of aged materials; and chemical engineering processes of explosives manufacturing. Since 1994, he has worked as the chemical engineer/project leader/demilitarization program leader for Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California. His work includes waste treatment technology R&D; abandoned chemical weapons (ACW); destruction processes for chemical agents and secondary wastes; high explosives synthesis and scale-up R&D; process R&D for treating mixed wastes and high explosives; design and prototyping of MSO plants for treating toxic waste streams; and developing processes for cleaning and recycling spent salts. Dr. Hsu received his Ph.D. in chemical engineering from Michigan State University in 1988. He currently holds six patents and has published over 40 articles.
Loren D. Koller is an independent consultant and former professor and dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine at Oregon State University. His areas
of expertise include pathology, toxicology, immuno-toxicology, carcinogenesis, and risk assessment. He is a former member of the NRC Committee on Toxicology and has participated on several of its subcommittees, primarily involved in risk assessment. He has served on the Institute of Medicine’s Committee on the Assessment of Wartime Exposure to Herbicides in Vietnam and been invited to serve on committees for the CDC, EPA, the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, and the U.S. Army. He received his D.V.M. from Washington State University and his Ph.D. in pathology from the University of Wisconsin.
William R. Rhyne is a retired risk and safety analysis consultant to the nuclear, chemical, and transportation industries. He has over 30 years’ experience associated with nuclear and chemical processing facilities and with the transportation of hazardous materials. From 1984 to 1987, he was the project manager and principal investigator for a probabilistic analysis of transporting obsolete chemical munitions. From 1997 to 2002, he was a member of the NRC Committee for the Review and Evaluation of Alternative Technologies for Demilitarization of Assembled Chemical Weapons (I and II). Dr. Rhyne has authored or coauthored numerous publications and reports on nuclear and chemical safety and risk analysis areas and is the author of Hazardous Materials Transportation Risk Analysis: Quantitative Approaches for Truck and Train. He is a current member of the NRC Transportation Research Board Hazardous Materials Committee and a former member of the Society for Risk Analysis, the American Nuclear Society, and the American Institute of Chemical Engineers. Dr. Rhyne received his B.S. in nuclear engineering from the University of Tennessee and M.S. and D.Sc. degrees in nuclear engineering from the University of Virginia.
Subhas K. Sikdar is the associate director for science for the National Risk Management Research Laboratory at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. As the director of the Sustainable Technology Division until January 2004, he was the primary spokesman for the EPA’s R&D on clean technologies and pollution prevention. He directed research, both intramural and extramural, on tools and methods for pollution prevention, cleaner process technologies, and demonstration and verification of cleaner technologies. Before joining the EPA in 1990, Dr. Sikdar held managerial positions at the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Boulder, Colorado, and General Electric’s Corporate Research & Development Center in Schenectady, New York. He began his professional career as a senior research engineer with Occidental Research Corporation in Irvine, California, in 1975. Dr. Sikdar earned his B.S. in chemistry, a B.Tech in chemical engineering, and an M.Tech in polymer science from Calcutta University in India. He received his M.S. and Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the University of Arizona. Dr. Sikdar is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), a fellow of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, an honorary fellow of the Indian Institute of Chemical Engineers, winner of three EPA bronze medals, an R&D 100 award (1990), AIChE’s Larry Cecil Award for Environmental Chemical Engineering (2002), and the University of Arizona’s Distinguished Engineering Alumnus Award (2003). Dr. Sikdar is the leader of the technical expert group for the Center of Excellence on Environmental Engineering and Hazardous Wastes, composed of several universities in Thailand.
Jack Solomon retired recently as director of technology assessment for Praxair, Inc., and is currently chairman of Vision 2020 for the Chemical Industry. At Praxair, Dr. Solomon was most recently responsible for leading the identification and assessment of outside technologies and new business opportunities. As part of Vision 2020, Dr. Solomon also led the development of a cross-industry R&D roadmap for nanomaterials, including working groups on environmental, health, and safety issues. Dr. Solomon participated in NRC’s New Directions in Manufacturing and served on the technical advisory board for Semiconductor Research Corporation as well as the review team for the National Nanotechnology Initiative He has also served on the board of the directors for the Council for Chemical Research and the National Hydrogen Association. He has been an invited speaker on various chemical science issues at the American Chemical Society, the Industrial Research Institute, and other national technical meetings. Dr. Solomon received a B.S. in chemistry from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a Ph.D. in physical chemistry from Columbia University.
Walter J. Weber, Jr. (NAE) is the Gordon M. Fair and Earnest Boyce Distinguished University Professor of Environmental Engineering at the University of Michigan, where he has taught and conducted research since 1963. He is also founding director of ConsEnSus, the College of Engineering’s academic program of
Concentrations in Environmental Sustainability (2001-present); founding director, Great Lakes and Mid-Atlantic Center for Hazardous Substance Research (1988-2002); founding director, Institute for Environmental Sciences, Engineering, and Technology (1997-2001); and founding director, National Center for Integrated Bioremediation Research and Development (1993-1999). A registered and professional engineer since 1963 and a diplomate of the American Academy of Environmental Engineers since 1975, Dr. Weber has consulted extensively with industrial, commercial, and governmental agencies throughout the world in the application of advanced technologies for solution of water supply, pollution control, and hazardous waste minimization and remediation. He served for a decade in the 1990s and early 2000s as a member and chairperson of the Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program of the Department of Defense. Dr. Weber has been recognized by the International Science Index as one of the most highly cited and quoted scientists in the world. He has served on the National Academy of Engineering’s Review Panel as well as the NRC’s Board on Environmental Studies and Toxicology. Dr. Weber received an Sc.B. in chemical engineering from Brown University, an MSE in civil engineering from Rutgers University, and a Ph.D. in water resources engineering from Harvard University. He was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 1985.
