Ralph S. Baker is the CEO and Technology Manager of TerraTherm, Inc., a remediation technology firm located in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. A Certified Soil Scientist (Maine) with an M.S. in soil chemistry and a Ph.D. in soil physics, he has 25 years' experience in the evaluation, design and implementation of technologies for in situ and on-site treatment of wastes in soil and groundwater. During over ten years as technical director of in situ remediation at ENSR Corporation, Dr. Baker served as an expert on a wide range of innovative physical, chemical and biological treatment technologies. Over the past several years and particularly since co-founding TerraTherm, Inc. in February 2000, Dr. Baker has focused his attention on application of in situ thermal desorption for remediation of contaminated soils via simultaneous application of heat by thermal conduction and vacuum.

Dr. Baker's in situ remediation experience includes well over thirty soil vapor extraction (SVE) projects, twenty in situ air sparging (IAS) projects, fifteen multi-phase extraction (MPE) projects; of these, at least twenty-five were dense nonaqueous phase liquid (DNAPL) sites and several have incorporated in situ thermal treatment. Approximately two dozen of Dr. Baker’s major projects have been CERCLA sites. The vast majority of his technical and project management assignments were for industrial or governmental clients, including several that were primarily of a research nature. Drawing on this experience, Dr. Baker served as project manager and principal coordinating author throughout the preparation of three comprehensive engineer manuals written under contract to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, one on SVE and Bioventing in 1995, another on IAS in 1997, and a third on MPE (including two-phase and dual-phase extraction and bioslurping) in 1999. Dr. Baker has served as invited chair of sessions on multi-phase extraction and bioslurping at several major technical conferences and has served as lead instructor of numerous technology workshops within the U.S. and abroad. In addition, he has authored over 40 scientific publications on in situ/on-site remediation and soil physics.

Email address: rbaker@terratherm.com