In addition to traditional civil engineering and land surveying, E&M provides a wide range of technical services to our Clients. Some of these include:

Environmental Site Assessments - reports for real property purchases where site contamination is of concern.

Building Inspections - inspection of existing buildings for structural problems and solutions.

Sewer Televising - inspection, by television camera, of sanitary and storm sewers to check for obstructions, leakage and breaks. We can also check certain interior piping down to 4 inches in size.

Sewer Smoke Testing - our equipment and technicians can help locate improperly constructed sewer connections, inflow and infiltration sources.

Digital Photo Inventory - inventory your equipment, buildings, street signs and your sites. Digital photographs are put on CD-ROM and include viewing software. Good for preparing for future insurance claims.

CAD Plans - we can take your building plans or measure up your buildings/rooms and put the floor plans on CD-ROM with viewing software either separately or in addition to the photo inventory above.

Third Party Construction Inspection - we have inspectors to witness the construction of your building or infrastructure improvements from an independent view point.

Grant Writing - have a project, but need some funding? We have people on staff who have prepared grant applications to Rural Development, Appalachia Regional Commission, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and NYS Environmental Facilities Corporation.

Corporate Presence Web Sites - we maintain several web sites and we can create one for your company as well. Realtors, you can have digital photos and descriptions of your properties on your own web site. Corporations and municipalities you can make yourself known by being on the web. We offer modest startup and maintenance fees.

As our sanitary sewer systems continue to disintegrate with age, treatment plant problems from hydraulic overloads due to the inflow of extraneous ground waters progressively gets worst. Why should we be concerned about this? The following presents the basic three (3) reasons:

As a hypothetical example; what is the approximate total yearly cost impact of 50,000 gallons per day of extraneous waters into a typical sanitary system at present prices?

Cost of transport and treatment; at $0.56/1,000 gal equals: $10,220.00

Cost of loss revenue from new customers; (50,000 gpd/500gpd/cust.) $400.00/cust./yr. equals: $40,000.00

For a Total of : $50,220.00/yr.

E&M has the experience, personnel and equipment to locate and recommend repair methods for this problem of extraneous ground waters in your sanitary sewer system. As shown by the figures above, this technical service has the potential of a very rapid revenue pay back period. The approach will vary from community, but basically will have the following steps:

Of course, it becomes non-cost-effective to try to remove 100 percent of this extraneous water from the system. Generally, the acceptable limit of this infiltration is 500 gallons per day per inch-mile of sanitary sewer.

I recently attended a seminar presented by the PADEP on the subjects of confined spaces and chlorine gas safety. The following is a brief discussion of these two (2) subjects.

Anyone who enters, or has employees who enter confined spaces should be aware of, and follow proper safety procedures.

OSHA says a confined space is a space that:

1. Is large enough and so configured that an employee can bodily enter and perform assigned work; and

2. Has limited or restricted means for entry or exit (for example, tanks, vessels, silos, storage bins, hoppers, vaults, and pits are spaces that may have limited means of entry); and

3. Is not designed for continuous employee occupancy.

Sewer manholes are confined spaces, as are trenches deeper than 4 feet.

Proper procedures prior to entry include testing for low oxygen, or poisonous gases. Poisonous gases could be methane, carbon monoxide, hydrogen sulfide, or chlorine.

There have been numerous recorded instances whereby a first entrant blacks out from bad air and his helper enters to try and help him and then also succumbs.

Once safe air is verified and the space is entered, the air should be continuously monitored while the space is occupied. One manufacturer of gas detection equipment is the Industrial Scientific Corp.

It is advisable for a minimum of three (3) people to be in a crew which requires a confined space to be entered. These would be the entrant, the attendant who watches from outside, and a helper, also outside.

OSHA has published a regulation titled "Permit-required confined spaces-19100146" which spells out the proper procedures to be followed for entering confined spaces safely.

Chlorine gas is poisonous and must be handled with extreme care. It is heavier than air, so if a leak occurs, the safest place to be is uphill or upwind. The following table illustrates the effect of various concentrations of chlorine gas.

Table 1 - EFFECT OF CHLORINE CONCENTRATION

Chlorine Concentration in Air and Degree of Hazard:

1000ppm - May be fatal with a few deep breaths.

100ppm - May be lethal with prolonged exposure.

40-60ppm - Exposure for 30 to 60 minutes may cause serious injury.

30ppm - Immediate danger to life and health; coughing, shortness of breath, chest pain, possible nausea and vomiting

15ppm - Throat irritation.

 5ppm - Short-term exposure limit. Noxiousness, difficulty breathing.

4ppm - One-hour exposure without serious effects. Irritation of eyes and nose.

1ppm - OSHA ceiling (8-hour time weighted exposure).

0.002-0.2ppm - Odor threshold.

There are kits available which contain the proper hardware which can temporarily stop leaks in most standard size chlorine tanks. These are called the A Kit, and the B Kit. Only people properly equipped with air packs can attempt to stop leaks. It is advisable to practice the use of these kits with all protective gear on so that when the need arises, responders can be more effective.