Site investigation and environmental due diligence

Before a site changes hands, or a spade goes into the ground, you need to know what is beneath it. I provide the investigation — and the judgement — that turns unknown ground into a decision you can defend to a board, a lender or a regulator.

Phase 1 desk study and preliminary risk assessment

A properly researched Phase 1 desk study is the cheapest risk-reduction money you will spend on a site: history, setting, a sound conceptual site model, and a clear view of whether there is a question worth answering intrusively at all. Often it settles the matter on its own.

Phase 2 site investigation and quantitative risk assessment

Where intrusive work is warranted, targeted Phase 2 investigation with generic and detailed quantitative risk assessment for human health and controlled waters, worked up in line with LCRM. The point is proportion: enough investigation to answer the question, and a risk assessment that decides what a development genuinely needs — no more, and no less.

Hydrogeology and controlled-waters risk assessment

As an environmental geologist by training, I assess risk to controlled waters and the wider water environment; building the conceptual site model, interpreting groundwater flow and potentiometric data, and running the long-term monitoring that shows contaminant trends over time.

That covers site-specific controlled-waters risk assessment (detailed quantitative risk assessment, to GP3 / LCRM), monitored natural attenuation programmes and the lines of evidence behind them, and work across multi-aquifer systems from superficial deposits to principal bedrock aquifers. For a major oil client I managed hydrogeological assessment across a portfolio of sites through to regulator sign-off and no-further-action — the same approach that closes out permit surrenders and satisfies the Environment Agency that impacts are being managed.

Baseline surveys for acquisition and permitting

Baseline soil and groundwater surveys to establish the reference position — whether for a permit application or to fix a known starting point before a transaction or a change of use.

Environmental due diligence for acquisition and lending

Environmental risk assessment of property and portfolios for acquisition, merger and sale-and-leaseback: clear answers for buyers, investors and lenders, including liability and remediation cost estimation where a number is what the deal actually turns on. Twenty-five years across landfill, gasworks, fuel and industrial sites means the estimate is grounded in what remediation really costs, not a textbook range.