With over 2,000 acres along the shores of the Great Salt Lake, the Kennecott Southshore Wetlands is an important habitat for migratory shorebirds and waterfowl. Kennecott Utah Copper, the second largest copper producer in the United States, wants the wetlands to remain vital.

Concerns over high levels of selenium in the wetlands led Kennecott Utah Copper to engage ecological modeler Dr. John Toll and a team of wildlife and toxicology experts in an ecological risk assessment study. The study's objective was to estimate the impact of selenium on birds in the area and determine the proportion of the nesting bird population potentially at risk from selenium exposure.

The team used BestFit and @RISK software from Palisade to conduct a site specific, probabilistic exposure assessment to estimate how much selenium was getting into bird eggs. According to Dr. Toll, "Thanks to @RISK we were able to avoid destructive sampling and our findings were more accurate."






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