Article Laboratories

Water Testing Cost Amendments

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Tags: Environment groundwaters testing

DEFRA’s Water Classification Directions to the Environment Agency

Could water testing costs (either as part of due diligence work or operationally in relation to discharge consents) be set to rise in the future?  Darren Wilcox of Peter Brett Associates LLP ponders this and other questions raised as a result of the draft Directions.

In October 2008, DEFRA issued a draft “Directions to the Environment Agency on classification of water bodies” for consultation as part of its duties under the Water Framework Directive (WFD). PBA has reviewed the draft and contributed to the consultation process through a direct response to DEFRA.

Surface Water Classification
We note that the proposed new requirements for classifying surface waters are significantly more complex than the existing Environment Agency General Quality Assessment (GQA) scheme for rivers and canals.

With the GQA scheme, analytical costs for determining the classification of a river sample are typically less than £20. To classify the same river sample using the proposed method in the new draft Directions could cost in excess of ten times this amount.

The Directions are also not clear on how many exceedances of the 33 environmental standards would be required in order to classify an surface water body as failing to achieve good chemical status.

Groundwater Classification
To classify groundwaters, DEFRA has produced different assessment standards for different aquifers in different catchments of England and Wales. This has lead to the publication of a 160 page annex detailing different groundwater quality thresholds.

In many cases, the proposed threshold values are lower than prescribed concentrations for UK drinking water (specified in the water supply regulations). PBA has questioned the sustainability of aspiring to a situation where groundwater quality is superior to tap water quality.

The low groundwater threshold values proposed may lead local authorities or the EA to set unreasonably stringent remediation target values for groundwater where brownfield sites have recorded slight groundwater contamination issues. This in turn could lead to excessive costs for brownfield redevelopment in the future.

Darren Wilcox
Peter Brett Associates LLP
dwilcox@peterbrett.com

Article Business Practice Data Management Executive Loss Prevention

Sign off Responsibility

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Tags: contract proposals

It is common for Clients to request that their consultant obtains “sign off” of proposals for site investigation, risk assessment and in particular remediation verification reports.  In the Client’s mind, this means a letter from the regulator on their headed paper absolving the Client from any responsibility for additional investigations etc or from any further “interference” on their site subsequent to remediation works.

Often the consultant can be caught between a rock and a hard place as the regulator may often refrain from commenting upon such reports, let alone “signing them off”.  So what is reasonable for the Client to expect, the Regulator to agree and the consultant to deliver? In addressing this aspect in recent guidance (Ref 1), text was drafted, reviewed and eventually agreed by both Environment Agency and local authority representatives and is reproduced below.

Normally, on receipt of a Verification Report, the local planning authority will take advice from their environmental health / contaminated land officers (and the Environment Agency in some circumstances) and if satisfied, formally discharge the relevant planning condition by writing to the applicant.  If there is no such planning condition, the local authority or Environment Agency should nevertheless acknowledge receipt of the Verification Report. While liability remains with the developer / their insurers, they will often look to obtain ‘sign off’ of these reports by the relevant regulator(s). Regulators will not do this however, or issue their own verification of the works, but they may be willing to do one or more of the following:

  • indicate whether they have reviewed the report;
  • state whether they are satisfied with the level of detail provided;
  • confirm that it appears to be reasonable given the data presented;
  • make a statement about whether (based on the information supplied) they are currently considering the need for any enforcement action under various regulatory regimes.

It is important to understand that it remains the developer’s responsibility to ensure that they have met the remediation objectives, made the site suitable for use and adequately protected all of the relevant receptors.

It is therefore important when a consultant is agreeing a scope of works with a Client that any requirement for “sign off” in the contract is clearly framed along these lines.  Consultants should not promise to obtain a commitment from the Environment Agency and/ or the local authority contaminated land officer that are beyond these limitations.  Equally, it is in the interests of all parties that the positive engagement with the regulator on a project is recognised by written acceptance of a report by the regulator, along the lines set out above.

For those involved in the Remediation of a site that has been “determined” as contaminated land under Part IIA  of the Environmental Protection Act the expectations of sign off, should be even more constrained.  This is because in these cases the Statutory Guidance states that any person who has carried out remediation as described in a Remediation Statement can notify the local authority (ie by submitting a Verification Report) providing the details of the “remediation claimed to have been carried out”.  The local authority is then under a duty to include the details of the remediation which is claimed to have been carried out on its Register. The guidance then states that “Although Part 2A does not include any formal “signing off” procedure, the Enforcing Authority may wish to consider writing to the Appropriate Person, confirming the position with respect to further enforcement action.” – – – and that the local authority “might confirm that it does not consider that it needs to serve a Remediation Notice, which it would need to do if appropriate remediation had not been carried out”.

Ref 1.  Guidance for the safe development of housing on land affected by contamination.  R&D 66:2008. Available for free download atwww.nhbc.co.uk/Builders/Technicaladviceandsupport/Publications/ContaminatedLandDevelopment

Article Safety

The Dangers of Trial Pitting

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Tags: danger safety

Alex Wright

This is Alex Wright.
Alex was a 27 year old experienced geotechnical engineer.
He lost his life on Friday 5th September 2008 when the side of a trial pit collapsed on him.  It took over 24 hours for the rescue team to recover his body.
Alex was simply doing his job.

The legal position ……..

  •  Probability of criminal proceedings against the company
  •  Probability of criminal proceedings against the “manager”

Health & Safety At Work Act 1974 – Section 37 – Offences by the body corporate.
“Where an offence is shown to have been committed with the consent or connivance of, or to have been attributed to any neglect on the part of, any director, manager……. he, as well as the body corporate, shall be guilty of that offence.”   The penalty may well be a prison sentence

The Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007

The Act applies to the corporate body and not to individuals of the company. The penalty could be a fine of 5 per cent of average annual turnover during the 3 years prior to sentencing.

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This photograph used to appear on the website of Alex’s Employer.

THIS SHOULD BE SEEN AS A WAKE-UP CALL TO THE GROUND INVESTIGATION INDUSTRY

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This trial pit is 5.5m deep.  What danger do you see in the picture?

How confident are you that your engineers:-

    • see the danger?
    • will not venture close to the edge (or into the pit)?
    • are conversant with your company’s safe working procedures?
Article Safety

Unexploded Ordnance – a Construction Industry Guide

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Tags: construction HSE Unexploded Ordnance

As the representative of the AGS on the project steering group for the forthcoming CIRIA construction industry guidance on UXO, Andy O’Dea of Peter Brett Associates LLP updates us on the scope of the guidance and the benefits it will bring.

In the March 2005 issue (number 49) of the AGS Newsletter, you published a letter from my colleague at Peter Brett Associates LLP (PBA), Richard Thomas, on the controversial issue of unexploded wartime bombs (UXBs).  It transpires that this was one of the contributing factors to CIRIA commissioning a research project to produce definitive guidance on the issue for the construction industry.  PBA has part funded the project and I have been involved throughout, representing both the AGS and PBA on the project steering group.  The final report is nearing completion and is likely to be published in the coming months.  I thought it was timely for me to write to update the AGS on the scope of the report and the benefits it will bring.

The assessment of risk associated with Unexploded Ordnance (UXO) is controversial and fraught with difficulties.  For example, several thousand items of ordnance are removed from construction sites in the UK each year (of which some 5% are live).  However, in the period 2006/2007 (readily available HSE records), no reported injuries to construction workers were attributed to incidents involving UXO.  This is in spite of other risks or accidents in the UK construction industry resulting in 77 fatalities, 3,711 major injuries and 7,108 other reportable injuries. Make no mistake about it, the risk associated with UXO is overwhelmingly influenced by the consequences of an event rather than the likelihood of encountering or detonating a device in the first instance.

Three main issues drove PBA to get involved in the project:

  1. A lack of any consistency in the assessment and reporting of UXO risk across the industry.
  2. An absence of scientific or methodical processes in the ‘black art’ of UXO threat assessment.
  3. The perceived conflict of interest in a UXO specialist providing advice on required mitigation measures and then offering contractor services to mitigate the risk.

 

We are pleased to say that all three issues have been addressed by the project guidance.

We feel that the report is a comprehensive and extremely useful piece of work that will help to dispel many of the myths surrounding UXO and allow future UXO risk assessments to be supported by a consistent and rigorous approach that is underpinned by scientific reasoning.  The report provides a comprehensive introduction to UXO and outlines the duties and responsibilities of the parties to a construction project in the context of UXO risk.  A clear and concise flow diagram outlines the risk management framework; from preliminary risk assessment (that can be carried out by a non-UXO specialist) through to detailed risk assessment, where required, (to be conducted only by a UXO specialist) and on to risk mitigation and implementation.  Each element of the risk management framework is described in full detail in subsequent chapters of the report.  Advice on emergency response planning and the appointment of UXO specialists is drawn out in the later chapters.

The report is supported by a dozen or so relevant case studies and especially important issues are emphasised in highlighted boxes.  Example risk assessment reports, verification reports and clearance certificates are provided in the appendices along with the ‘nuts and bolts’ of UXO survey techniques, equipment and limitations.

The report has been through a rigorous consultation process and has been distributed widely across the industry for comment on a number of occasions.  Consultation responses have been received from developer clients, regulators, consultants, contractors, infrastructure bodies, government defence organisations, academia and professional bodies such as AGS.  A special note of thanks goes to those at the AGS who have given their time and expertise in reviewing the report and making the consultation process a success.

This report presents a major advance in helping to provide a consistent and robust approach to the assessment of UXO risk in the construction industry and is to be welcomed.  Undoubtedly, it is a first step and further guidance will follow in time.  However, CIRIA Report RP732 Unexploded Ordnance (UXO) – a construction industry guide, is a big step in the right direction.

Andy O’Dea
Senior Associate
Peter Brett Associates LLP
17 September 2008

Article Data Management Laboratories

FPS Electronic Pile Schedule

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Tags: data electronically piling

The long nights of re-typing pile schedules could be a thing of the past as the Federation of Piling Specialists launches a standardised form of pile schedule for use by Contractors and Engineers alike in the driven and bored piling market. For too long now the procurement of piling has involved the laborious inputting of piling data by engineers into schedules with a wide variety of formats. This has usually been followed by the re-typing of the same data by each of the piling tenderers, incorporating of course a few human errors along the way. This same data has then been tweaked and adjusted each time the designer has issued new information. At contract stage, it has often then fallen to the Engineer to rigorously check the successful tenderer’s piling schedule against his own design details.

This is obviously a very inefficient way of working and with increasingly tight tender periods this wasted time could be better spent on honing the design solution and improving the quality of the end product. Furthermore it is sometimes the case that unnecessary human errors remain unspotted and deficient piles are as a result incorporated into the permanent works. Differing formats of information, particularly pile loading has lead to misunderstandings on numerous occasions between Engineer and Piling Contractor.

It is against this background that the FPS has developed a standardised pile schedule in Excel format which it is hoped will be used by the Engineer as a simple way of conveying pile design information such as pile diameter, cut-off level, applied loadings etc to the Piling Contractor. The key features of the pile schedule are as follows:

  • Uses a standardised terminology showing all of the information required to permit construction schedules to be prepared. Colour coding denotes responsibility for completing data cells.
  • Allows new revisions to be prepared either from scratch or by copying previous revisions.
  • Allows each revision to be saved with a unique file reference.
  • Scheduling to be emailed in a standard format to reduce potential delays in retyping pile schedules.
  • Allows basic or advanced loadings to be specified.

With the information provided electronically the Piling Contractor can supply the Client, his designer and follow on contractors with as-built information in a standard format which can be used easily by all parties and which will act as a key document in the Piling Completion Report. Furthermore the pile schedule is designed to be easily compatible with new data handling systems such as DIGGS.

Obviously the success of the new pile schedule, which can be downloaded for free without prior registration from the FPS website, will be reliant on the numbers of practitioners who use it regularly. Therefore the FPS is very keen to receive feedback from users so that any improvements which may be necessary can be implemented as early as possible. Please contact the Federation of Piling Specialists at fps@fps.org.uk.

Article Business Practice Executive

Apprentices – back in vogue

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Tags: apprentices Drilling Geotechnical

Equipe Training Limited has delivered its’ first courses in September from their newly established Drilling AcademyTM near Banbury, Oxfordshire.  The courses were delivered on behalf of the British Drilling Association and comprised Module 5 – Site Management and Module 6 – Drilling and Grouting of the Land Drilling Sector Apprenticeship Scheme.
Brian Stringer, National Secretary of the British Drilling Association, said that “the BDA were delighted and impressed with the courses’ delivery and the very professional arrangements, content of the courses and the manner in which they were delivered”.

 
The courses were attended by apprentices from leading UK drilling companies and incorporated theory sessions provided from the Drilling AcademyTM as well as a site visit to an operational site managed by M&J Drilling. Keith Spires, Operational Director of Equipe Training, said that “the apprentices were being given a unique opportunity to experience all aspects of their trade”.

 
The apprenticeship modules, in their current format, were developed in 2007 by the British Drilling Association working with ConstructionSkills (formerly CITB) in response to UK Government initiatives for improving adult learning and establishing a skilled workforce. It is reported that ConstructionSkills, which oversees training within the construction industry, has secured £133m from government for a three year skills delivery plan which includes over 2,000 specialist apprentice starts.

 
The BDA and Equipe will be working together to encourage the geotechnical and drilling industry to provide new Apprentices for courses starting in early 2009 and welcomes any enquiries.

 

EQUIPE have applied to join the AGS and course information will be circulated to Members when available.

Article Business Practice Executive

Recruitment Aided!

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Tags: Ground Engineering Occupation Recruitment

The Ground Forum is delighted to announce that 19 ground engineering job titles have been included in the new ‘Shortage Occupations List’ (SOL) which was published by the Migration Advisory Committee on 9th September.  Inclusion of these 19 ground engineering jobs in the new SOL means that, when the new points based immigration system comes into operation, these occupations will qualify for a work permit without having to accumulate sufficient points by other means.  In the meantime the 16 ground engineering disciplines remain on the old SOL, as negotiated by Ground Forum in 2005 and 2007.

Inclusion of these ground engineering occupations on the SOL has been described as “our life saver” by one senior geotechnical consultant.  Why?  Because it aids recruitment of skilled staff from outside the European Economic Area (EEA) without which timely delivery of the ground engineering sector’s current workload would be impossible.

The Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) was set up by the UK Border Agency, a department within the Home Office, in 2007 in order to provide independent and rigorous identification of those occupations suffering shortages in the UK, with persistent vacancies which cannot be filled from within the EEA.

Keith Gabriel, the Chairman of Ground Forum, commented “we are delighted that the MAC has recognised the continuing skills shortage affecting the ground engineering sector” and added “I wish to acknowledge the excellent work carried out by Dianne Jennings and her team in Ground Forum’s secretariat; we had only three weeks in April to undertake the necessary research and compile a full report for the MAC; they pulled out all the stops to ensure that our research and report were both comprehensive and submitted on time – a superb effort.”

The ground engineering job titles included in the new Shortage Occupation List are included under two classes of the Standard Occupational Classification 2000 (SOC):
Civil Engineer (SOC 2121):
Geotechnical Engineer
Geotechnical Design Engineer
Geotechnical Specialist
Tunnelling Engineer
Geologists (plus Physicists and Meteorologists) (SOC 2113):
Geologist
Geological Engineer
Hydrogeologist
Geophysical Specialist
Geophysicist
Geoscientist
Contaminated Land Engineer
Geoenvironmental Engineer
Reservoir Panel Engineer
Rock Mechanics Engineer
Soil Mechanics Engineer
Geomechanics Engineer
Landfill Engineer
Contaminated Land Specialist
Geoenvironmentalist

For full details of the new SOL and the accompanying reports see:http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/aboutus/workingwithus/indbodies/mac/macfirstshortagelist/

Anyone wishing to employ people from outside the EEA now also needs a licence.  Go to http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/employers/points/  for an application form and for information about the requirements that HR systems and companies must meet in order to obtain a licence.

Article Loss Prevention

Are your e-mails and websites legal

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Tags: liability

Requirements of the Companies Regulations 2006

From 1st January 2007 external business emails issued by public and private companies and limited liability partnerships MUST include the following information in legible text:

  • Company or partnership registration number
  • Place of registration (ie: England & Wales or Scotland)
  • Registered office address

These requirements were introduced in The Companies (Registrar, Languages and Trading Disclosures) Regulations 2006 which updated the Companies Act 1985 in order to comply with European law, namely the First Company Law Amendment Directive.  They effectively extend the requirements to show this information on companies’ “business letters” to all electronic documents and order forms.

The same information must also be displayed on the websites of these classes of organisation.  This requirement removes the ambiguities previously associated with the requirements of the E-commerce Regulations 2002 which referred to “geographic address” and required the registration number of organisations “registered in a trade or similar register” to be listed on their websites.

This article is provided solely to raise readers’ awareness of new legislation.  Readers should seek professional legal advice to ensure that their emails websites and documents comply with all relevant legislation.

Article Business Practice Data Management Executive Laboratories

Eurocode 7 letter

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Tags: EC7 Ground Engineering

Dear Editor

I have been delivering lectures on EC7 parts 1 and 2 for a while now, and I remain amazed and appalled at the level of ignorance amongst our colleagues about the status of the EC7 documents, particularly the TC341 Standards, and the associated changes to the UK National Standards. I know that BSI update their indexes and provide update news, and I know that we have tried publication in Ground Engineering and lectures around the country, and these efforts should all continue. Nevertheless, at a recent lecture in Cambridge (regional group) only one out of about 60 present knew about the implemented standards, and that one had attended a previous lecture.

Part of the problem may be that there is no one location where this information is pulled together, so I have done this on my website.  I am offering to maintain this simple tabulation of the current status for the benefit of others.

The link is http://www.drnorbury.co.uk/index.php?id=427.

Regards

David Norbury

Article Business Practice Contaminated Land

Environmental Permitting regulations

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Tags: pollution waste

The Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations came into force on the 6th April 2008.  They merge Waste Management Licensing (WML) and Pollution Prevention and Control (PPC) regimes into a single system focussed on environmental outcomes and customer services.

In combining the regimes, the application forms and guidance have been simplified. The permitting options have also been improved by the introduction of standard permits.

All PCC permits and waste licences have automatically become environmental permits. Permits will not be re-issued and the conditions have not been changed, customers will be notified of this when they receive their subsistence invoice.

For more information, contact the Environment agency and request a copy of their booklet ‘Cutting Red Tape, Environmental Permitting Regulations’

Call: 08708 506 506
E-mail: enquiries@environment-agency.gov.uk

Article Business Practice Executive

A new system for migrant workers

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Tags: contribution migration sponsorship

On Friday 29 February 2008, a new immigration system was launched to ensure that only those with the right skills or the right contribution will be able to come to the United Kingdom to work and study. The points-based system was designed to enable migration to be controlled more effectively, to tackle abuse and to identify the most talented workers.

Underpinning the new migration system is a five tier framework. The five tiers and the dates from which we will start accepting applications under them are:

Tier Applications open
Tier 1 (General): highly skilled workers, such as scientists and entrepreneurs From 29 February 2008
Tier 2: skilled workers with a job offer to fill gaps in United Kingdom labour force In the autumn of 2008
Tier 3: limited numbers of low skilled workers needed to fill temporary labour shortages This tier is currently suspended
Tier 4: students In the spring of 2009
Tier 5: temporary workers and youth mobility scheme: people allowed to work in the United Kingdom for a limited period of time to satisfy primarily non-economic objectives In the autumn of 2008

 

Ground Engineers fall under tier 2 and will need a certain number of points to qualify.  People transferring within the company (Intra Company Transfer Route) should have enough points  ( full details have not yet been anounced)and if Ground Engineers remain on the Shortage Occupation List, qualification should also be automatic. The Ground Forum have already submitted an application to retain Ground Engineers on the list).

Most applicants coming to the United Kingdom, or wanting to remain in the UK to work or study, will need to have a certificate of sponsorship from a licensed sponsor to qualify for permission to enter or stay, as well as meeting the points-based assessment.

To become an employer and sponsor of migrant workers a licence must be applied for. Sponsors must agree to meet a number of sponsorship duties which include record keeping, recording and compliance with the Home office and tier System.

Once given a licence, employers will be added to the Register of Sponsors, and will be able to issue certificates of sponsorship when applications for the relevant tiers are accepted later in the year.

The licence will be valid for four years, starting from the day it is issued or the day that applications start for the relevant tier, whichever is the later.

Sponsors applying for a licence for Tier 2 (General) – skilled worker and/or Tier 2 – intra-company transfers can apply to go on the register of sponsors now.

Article Safety

AGS manual handling

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Tags: handling injury safety

More than a quarter of accidents that have occurred at work and have been reported to the enforcing authorities each year, are associated with manual handling.  During the period from 1990 to 1995, an average of 1,181 people annually suffered major injury, and 51,103 suffered injury resulting in more than three days off work.  This makes manual handling the largest single cause of injury at work.  It is not just the lifting of heavy loads that causes injury – often relatively lightweight objects picked up and carried awkwardly can result in major injury.

Virtually all aspects of our industry involve the manual handling of tools, samples, equipment, etc., of varying weights and dimensions.  Handling can be significantly compromised by difficult site conditions, such as slippery, wet, sticky, or muddy ground surfaces and perhaps variations in ground levels.

 

Most drilling equipment associated with CP boreholes, for example: heavy drilling/sampling tools, sinker bars, standard penetration- test trip hammers/rods, casing, and certain drilling consumables, pose a significant manual handling risk to site operatives.

Manual handling of, for example, the standard penetration test (SPT) trip hammer, at 110kg, remains a significant risk – and it is neither feasible nor practical to dismantle the hammer into manageable components.

In these and other circumstances it is a requirement of legislation to eliminate or reduce the risk to an acceptable level by introducing control measures to achieve safe working practices.

For carrying out a manual-handling risk assessment at any site, apply the acronym: ‘TILE’, which is derived from Task, Individual, Load and Environment, and described as follows:

Task

Consider distance of the load from the body, the movement of the body to pick up the item (including twisting, stooping and reaching), and frequency of the lifting task.  Appropriate control measures may include the changing of working layout and the avoidance of lifting from ground level.  This might include, for example, the placement of SPT rods on bandstands; the storage of materials at waste height, and the use of a drilling winch where appropriate.

Individual

Safe manual handling is dependent on the strength and physical fitness of the person carrying out the task, and whether the person has had appropriate manual handling training. Only the most physically competent and appropriately trained personnel, and appropriate number of personnel, should carry out the lifting of such heavy objects.

Load

Weight of load, centre of gravity of load, and size and shape of the load, should all be considered prior to load handling.  If the handling risk is unacceptable, it may be possible to break the load into smaller, manageable components (for example, using shorter casing and sinker bar lengths).  Smaller sample bags should be considered.

Environment

The working environment may significantly compromise manual handling tasks especially when they are performed outside on difficult terrain and in challenging weather conditions.  Effective controls in such conditions include creating a safe and well-managed working area that has no trip hazards.  The individual/s performing the task should be wearing appropriate clothing and personal protective equipment (PPE).

All manual handling tasks associated with site-investigation activities should be assessed using the TILE acronym above.

Other site tasks that involve the use (and lifting) of heavy equipment include: plate loading and California-bearing ratio (CBR) tests.  The same precautions and rules for lifting apply, i.e. breaking down the load into manageable components to achieve safe handling practices.  Where a reduction of load is not practical, a risk assessment should be carried out to assess the manual handling task and the necessary control measures required.

Manual handling of lesser loads, e.g. samples, can pose a significant risk if not managed correctly.  To avoid lifting excessive sample loads, the weight of bulk samples can be limited by the use of 15kg-bags, for example. Instructions can be given not to over fill bags.   Environmental sampling commonly requires double or even treble sampling, some of the samples of which are stored in glass containers. Glass adds significantly to the total weight of samples recovered.  Therefore, cool boxes used for storage and transportation of the glass containers should not be overfilled; the contents should be limited to a manageable load per box.

In summary, manual handling poses a significant risk to site operatives when carrying out site investigations, although the risks can be significantly reduced by the breaking down of equipment and the adoption of good management and safe working practices, including the training of personnel.  Where a load or task cannot be practicably reduced or broken down, a risk assessment must be carried out to ensure that there are no unacceptable risks to the individuals performing a lifting task.

 

References

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) Manual Handling Operations Regulations 1992, as amended in 2002(1), http://www.hse.gov.uk/.

 

John R Pulsford – Associate Director
RSK Geoconsult Ltd