EBA’s commitment to innovation in providing solutions and services to our clients was recently underlined with the roll-out of several new capabilities by the Geophysics Group. The group has added equipment and staff capability in the areas of seismic surveying, MASW (ground stiffness), concrete integrity examination, and greenhouse gas detection. These new techniques complement our existing services to provide an ever-broadening spectrum of non-invasive mapping capabilities for a range of environments throughout North America.
Engineering seismic surveying has long been a key technique for determining ground structure through the use of direct wave, refraction, and reflection methods, but in recent years, a new technique — MASW (Multiple Analysis of Surface Waves) — has emerged as a powerful tool for mapping geotechnical properties, such as the shear modulus, while limiting the need for invasive testing. This can have major cost and environmental benefits, and offers the advantage of continuous 2D profiling of shear properties across engineering sites. EBA has acquired the equipment and software to offer both MASW and more traditional seismic direct wave, refraction, and reflection profiling services to support your ground engineering projects. We can provide detailed information on the depth, stiffness, rippability, and structure of bedrock and overlying sediments, generating information that can be added directly to geotechnical models and design calculations.
Testing the condition of concrete by non-destructive means is an increasing requirement as infrastructure and buildings age or are affected by hazardous events such as fires. To greatly expand on our existing rebar mapping capabilities using GPR, EBA recently purchased and trained staff in the use of an Olson Instruments NDE-360 ultrasonic and impact echo testing unit, a highly portable survey instrument that allows mapping of pre-tensioned cables, grouting, voids, and areas of poor structural integrity within concrete slabs. As with our MASW capability, this new service enables us to work more closely with our engineering groups and external clients, to provide low-impact solutions to seemingly intractable structural problems.
The ability to monitor greenhouse gases has long been important to waste management practitioners. A recent development in this field has led to major improvements in the accuracy of gas identification. Laser technology uses the narrow band of light frequencies, whose energy is attenuated by molecules of individual gases, to detect the concentrations of those gases in the natural environment. EBA is pleased to announce that we can now provide a portable closed-path laser gas detection service to our clients, using instrumentation developed by Boreal Laser Inc. The system offered is sensitive to a range of common gases in low concentrations, including methane, carbon dioxide, hydrogen sulphide, ammonia, and hydrogen fluoride.
Gas concentrations are detected using the closed-cell laser system, which is mounted on an all-terrain vehicle (ATV) or truck equipped with a differential GPS system, and can be used as a reconnaissance or mapping tool. Once areas of increased gas levels have been identified and the individual gas signatures have been characterized, finer-scale surveys or intrusive gas sampling can be conducted. This approach removes a large degree of the uncertainty associated with the location of migrating underground gas seeps, and improves the quality of site sampling networks through informed design. It is offered either as a stand-alone service or in combination with geophysical survey techniques designed to map the distribution of buried waste or structures that may be associated with gas generation.
For more information on these exciting new services, or to discuss our wider geophysical survey capabilities, please contact Mr. Neil Parry (EBA Edmonton, nparry@eba.ca).
This page was last updated on: 10/2/2009 12:55:00 PM
