Expanding from geotechnical Cone Penetration Test (CPT) into other services is a great way to grow your business. Evaluating subsurface soil contamination provides many business opportunities and a way to differentiate yourself from other CPT service providers – allowing you to protect your business, while expanding into new regions and adding clients.

In many instances, the existence of environmental contaminations in an area is known, but the question that needs to be answered is, “where is it”? In other posts, we explain how CPT works, and how it can be used to characterize the strata underground hundreds of feet deep, depending upon the actual subsurface conditions, the equipment being used etc., In addition to identifying soil types by layer and depth, geo-technical CPT testing also helps to establish groundwater levels and potential migration pathways. This makes it useful for identifying where contamination may migrate or be confined. Establishing a depth profile of the contamination underground and how the ‘plume’ is located and migrated, or where it is likely to expand in the future is vital to establishing a cleanup or remediation plan. Once contamination has been shown to be likely, our discrete soil and ground water sampling equipment delivers physical samples for confirmation.

Once CPT became well-established and proven as a geo-technical evaluation tool, it was natural to try and see what other types of testing could be accomplished using the same tools. In addition to mapping groundwater conditions with in-situ pore pressure transducers, CPT tools that sense the direct presence of various types of hydrocarbons and other volatile organic compounds at depth are now available. A variety of cone sensors can be used to test for specific types of contamination. Multiple CPT equipment modules can be configured with multiple sensors, including soil moisture resistivity, video, radiation and sensing for the presence of hydrocarbons. We are particularly excited about our highly innovative ultraviolet LED fuel fluorescence detection system that directly detects the presence of fuels underground!

When considering entering any part of the environmental remediation industry, it is vital to keep your engineers and workers safe. We provide modules designed to keep workers and engineers safe from contamination in hazardous areas, including our detachable steam cleaning head which de-contaminates the in-situ equipment With Vertek® as your equipment manufacturer for subsurface contaminant location and characterization you are doing the very best to keep your employees safe.

It’s also vitally important that your testing does not introduce further contamination into the area. Because with CPT, the test instruments are ‘pushed’, there is no drill fluids required for lubrication that might be contaminants themselves. Since there are no drill cuttings like with conventional drilling methods, you don’t have to worry about the disposal of drill cuttings, which sometimes are hazardous waste in and of themselves.

As you expand your business, you will want to provide your client with the information they need in a fast and efficient way. In-situ (testing in situation, or on location) CPT testing is the fastest way to get data from the test to the environmental engineers and scientists so that they are minimizing their project costs. CPT investigations allow for more collection of data with dynamic field characterization and immediate response. You can make a simple ROI case for CPT testing for environmental evaluation to your clients.

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