Environmental assessment and remediation are becoming increasingly important in the changing world. Such assessment often requires the combined talents of professionals in many disjoint fields and that they communicate with one another in a common language. The Northwest Research Center for Statistics and the Environment, based on some of the ideas of the old National Research Center for Statistics and the Environment is created to provide a platform for such multi-disciplinary interaction between multiple sites in the Pacific Northwest with respect to statistical analysis of environmental concerns. It is the goal of the Center to facilitate research and education in these areas, and to ensure that this work be made available to the public as well as to the scientific community through seminars, workshops, and electronic media.