After performing geoelectric liner leak location and integrity surveys worldwide since about 1985 and teaching others how to do so since 2004, Dr. Ian D. Peggs, P.E., P.Eng. (I-CORP INTERNATIONAL Inc.) reports that he has sold his survey equipment to Tom Seymour of Terra Firma Laboratories in Melbourne, Australia. The transfer occurred during what was Dr. Peggs’s fifth trip to Oz in 2017.
During the trip, Peggs also gave three days of practical instruction to Terra Firma technical staff, spent one day visiting three of their projects, and one day presenting a workshop to about 80 of their potential clients.
Geoelectric liner survey training in Australia. The demand for liner surveys and CQA expertise has risen sharply in the country. It continues to grow in importance for North America too. Photo by I-CORP INTERNATIONAL.
“Due to possible inclement weather, a [geolectric liner survey test] pond and two soil-covered pads were constructed indoors in a large warehouse,” Dr. Peggs writes. “Of course, the weather was perfect.”
GEOELECTRIC LINER SURVEYS OPPORTUNITES
Of note, the workshop included Geofabrics Australasia’s innovative graphene-modified Bidim conductive nonwoven geotextile (engineered with Imagine IM). The unique material enables electrical surveys to be performed in otherwise untestable situations.
Dr. Peggs, who founded Geosynthetica in 1999 (sold in late 2010), has always been one to work in exchanges with many other engineers on his trips and to recognize the value of these encounters. (It’s one of the reasons Geosynthetica was founded as an open publication: to promote interaction.)
RELATED: Avoiding Whales in Anaerobic Digesters
He notes that in Melbourne, he was able to sit down over dinner with an impressive crew of geosynthetics experts: Mike Sadlier, Graham Fairhead, Peter Tzelepis, Brendan Swifte, and Malek Bouazza.
Although not doing the conventional geoelectrical surveys any more, Dr. Peggs will continue to offer rapid landfill gas spectrometry surveys on geomembrane caps and acoustic surveys where there are suspected holes in conductive locations such as at seals between geomembrane and concrete.
Dr. Peggs, speaking to employees and guests of Terra Firma Laboratories.
“The demand for surveys is increasing rapidly in Australia,” he notes, “as most states are following Victoria’s requirement for ALRs (Action Leakage Rates) of 10 lphd.”
Importantly, he emphasizes that there continues to be interest in experienced CQA people who can work in North America between May and October and in Australia between November and April.
He encourages interested CQA personnel to contact him for more details. Dr. Peggs can be reached at icorp@geosynthetic.com.
