| Water Quality |
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We have been investigating surface and ground water quality concerns for many reasons. These include environmental protection, to initiate remediation, to establish cause, and sometimes responsibility or to identify treatment needs for potable, irrigation or industrial supplies. Our expertise covers field-testing and evaluation of laboratory results for both standard and the rarer suites of water quality chemistry determinands. We undertake periodic and regular testing and evaluation covering nutrients through to pesticides, from BOD through to endocrine-disrupters. We have complementary skills in ecological assessments of water quality, including using aquatic invertebrate, diatom, algae and macrophytes surveys to assess whether the ecological status is affected by organic enrichment, eutrophication or low flows, as appropriate. For ground water we use hydrochemistry to evaluate ground water flows as well as to predict potential long-term contamination of abstractions, for example from nitrates or point-source contaminants. Water quality parameters are used to identify sources of water. With such tools we model thermal plumes, dispersion of effluent from long-sea outfalls through to the development and control of algal blooms in confined water bodies. |
