Session: Special Session Symposium--Soils and Environmental/Urban Hazards

Title: Special Session Symposium--Soils and Environmental/Urban Hazards

Session Description: Environmental hazards and natural disasters bear tremendous risks to human health within North America and beyond. Relevant issues include (but are not limited to) hurricanes, flooding events, earthquakes, landslides, fires, chemical spills/releases, heavy metal contaminants, and pathogens. The purpose of this session is to address these issues through the context of soils, as they play an important role in either initiating, preventing, moderating, or exacerbating the effects of disasters across multiple scales. Assessing the risk of disasters in relation to local soil systems, modeling of environmental hazards and urban disasters, studies on the fate and transport of hazardous materials or pathogens in relation to natural and anthropogenic events, and remediation of various contaminants are all possible topics to be addressed.