Wetland and Waters of the US Delineation
The staff at W&E has assessed and delineated thousands of acres of wetlands and miles of stream channel. W&E's staff has had many of our delineations confirmed by regulatory agencies. W&E has conducted many stream impact assessments and perennial, intermittent and ephemeral stream determinations. W&E personnel are experienced in the use of sub-meter GPS equipment for resource mapping, having used the equipment since 1994. In the office our staff are well versed and highly skilled in the use of ESRI’s ArcGIS software for mapping resources and depicting project components. W&E staff have completed wetlands delineations in DE, IL, ME, NC, NJ, NY, OH, PA and VA.
Wetlands Functional Assessment
Our staff are certified to perform wetland functions and values assessments and have used a variety of the methodologies that have been developed over the years to compare existing wetlands to designs for restored, enhanced or create wetlands; to assess the cumulative impacts of a proposed project, and as a guide to minimize overall wetland impacts on large linear projects. W&E regularly uses the following functions and values assessment methodologies:
Ecological Restoration
W&E staff are experts in the field of ecological restoration, having designed many acres of wetlands, including tidal and non-tidal wetlands. Our staff have designed, permitted and overseen the construction of hundreds of acres of wetlands that were created, restored and/or enhanced. Many of our ecological restoration projects were for replacing wetlands that were impacted by a permitted activity. We have worked on wetland mitigation banks and management plans for large tracts of land where our clients sought to remove non-native invasive plants introduce a sustainable native plant community. Our staff have been involved with wetlands restoration projects of regional significance. Staff at W&E were the owner's representative at the Richard P. Kane Wetlands Mitigation Bank, in Moonachie, New Jersey, the largest wetlands mitigation bank ever undertaken in New Jersey.
Natural Resources Banking
W&E provides full service assessment, market analysis and design services for natural resource bank projects of all kinds. Our staff have prepared concepts for a number of proposed wetlands mitigation banks, including the development of concept plans for endangered species banks in Pennsylvania and New York. Our staff were the owner's representative at the Richard P. Kane Wetlands Mitigation Bank in Moonachie, New Jersey, the largest wetlands mitigation bank ever undertaken in New Jersey.
Ecological Risk Assessment
W&E's professionals are experts in the practice area of Ecological Risk Assessment. Our staff have prepared a wide variety of work plans, sampling and analysis plans, and quality assurance/quality control plans for all manner of ecological risk investigations. Our experts have been performing ecological risk based work and preparing ecological risk documents since the early 1990s when EPA began requiring Ecological Evaluations during the RI/FS process for CERCLA sites. Our professionals have designed and executed studies for investigating ecological risks in freshwater streams and rivers, ponds, tidal marsh (fresh and saltwater), wetlands and a variety of terrestrial habitats. W&E negotiated a risk based cleanup level for creek sediments impacted by a former manufactured gas plant. W&E staff have performed ecological risk assessment work in IL, MA, ND, NJ, NY, PA, SD, VA, and WA. Our staff have designed studies to investigate potential ecological risks, overseen and executed the field investigations and prepared final reports to document findings of under the following programs:
Natural Resource Damage Assessment
W&E provides full service Natural Resource Damage Assessment, assessing a wide variety of natural resources, including valuing damaged resources and valuing the uplift from proposed damage offset projects, using Visual HEA software. Our staff have worked on a variety of projects that had surface water and wetland impacts. Our staff have been called upon to value natural resource uplift projects that were proposed in Illinois, Maine and New Jersey and they have compared the value of the ecological uplift from those proposed restoration, preservation and enhancement projects.
Stormwater Management
W&E has considerable experience with a wide variety of Stormwater Control Measures (SCMs). In 2007, W&E worked with Temple University's Center for Sustainable Communities on the Pennypack Creek Watershed Act 167 Plan for improving the management of stormwater in the Pennypack Creek watershed. The Plan identified over 150 SCM opportunities throughout the watershed and the Center retained W&E to conduct a field reconnaissance of each location, assess the feasibility of the recommended control measure, and then prepared a detailed cost estimate for each of the SCM opportunities that were identified. In 2008, W&E again worked with the Center to perform a similar scope of work for the Fort Washington Area Flooding and Transportation Improvement Study.
In addition to single site stormwater management, W&E has considerable experience with the NPDES Municipal Separate Storm Sewer System (MS4) permit program, having obtained permits, and set up the MS4 Permit programs for the first five year permit period for one county, four boroughs, and five townships. W&E also performs NPDES permit monitoring activities such as, benthic invertebrate sampling, water sampling and regulatory reporting. W&E has conducted over 450 stormwater infiltration tests on more than 65 sites, across six counties and in 35 different municipalities for the purpose of designing SCMs. In addition to designing green infrastructure, W&E conducts infiltration testing using double-ring and falling head test methods and is highly skilled in assessing and interpreting subsurface soil conditions and whether those conditions are appropriate for infiltrating stormwater.
Green Stormwater Infrastructure
W&E has been designing and building green stormwater infrastructure (GSI) since 2006. Our projects have included stormwater treatment wetlands, stormwater wet-ponds, stormwater infiltration trenches, stormwater infiltration galleries, bio-infiltration/bio-retention basins and swales, and rain gardens. In 2006, W&E designed, permitted and constructed four SCMs demonstration projects with the Temple-Villanova Sustainable Stormwater Initiative (www.t-vssi.org) at Pennypack Ecological Restoration Trust in southern Montgomery County, PA. In 2007, W&E assisted Huntingdon Valley Country Club in obtaining a Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection Growing Greener grant for the design, permitting and installation of a 300+ foot long stormwater infiltration trench on the Club's property along Paper Mill Road, in Upper Moreland Township, Montgomery County, PA.In 2016 we designed and constructed an approximately one-acre stormwater treatment wetland (STW) on The College Settlement of Philadelphia's Camp property, in Horsham Township, Montgomery County, PA. This project was completed for Pennypack Ecological Restoration Trust using a National Fish and Wildlife Foundation grant from the Delaware River Restoration Fund.
In 2018, W&E completed work on a stormwater basin retrofit and bio-infiltration/bio-retention swales at the Upper Moreland Township School District's Middle School and Elementary School complex, with MRNenvironmental, Inc. W&E designed the GSI for MRNenvironmental, Inc. using Growing Greener grant funds obtained from Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection. This GSI will be used by the School District to teach a number of environmental education lessons and a variety of mathematical lessons.
Environmental Permitting
W&E has prepared applications and obtained permits for projects in DE, NC, NJ, NY, PA and VA. We have extensive experience with obtaining 404 Permits from the US Army Corps of Engineers. In many states there are Joint Permit programs where the state and Corps issue a single Joint Permit. W&E has applied for and obtained many Waivers and General and Individual permits from Pennsylvania's Joint Permit program and New Jersey's assumed Freshwater Wetlands program, where they issue permits on behalf of the Corps. W&E has also obtained permits from New Jersey's Waterfront Development, Coastal Wetlands, CAFRA, Flood Hazard Area, and Highlands programs. W&E has also applied for and obtained environmental permits for a wide array of other activities including but not limited to, permits for new and maintenance dredging, NJPDES and NPDES permits for stormwater discharges, etc.
Dredge Material Management
W&E's professionals have developed and implemented numerous sediment material sampling and analysis plans for dredging projects in Delaware River, New Jersey's Inner Coastal Waterways, the Arthur Kill and a creek in South Dakota. Our staff have extensive experience with managing a wide variety of dredge projects, from increasing the depth of a pond to cleaning out navigation channels and berths. W&E has obtained permits for dredge projects ranging from as small as 2,200 CY to as large as 107,000 CY. Our professionals are very familiar with a number of different dewatering technologies (including add-mixtures and geo-tubes). W&E has prepared detailed disposal and reuse plans and dredging/dewatering specifications. In addition to the investigation and management of dredge material, our staff has prepared feasibility plans, conceptual designs and permits for the beneficial reuse of the dredge material from a number of projects in New Jersey including one project that involved 8,500,000 CY.
Environmental Assessment and Environmental Impact Statement
The staff at W&E have prepared numerous Categorical Exclusion Evaluations, Environmental Impact Assessments and Environmental Impact Statements for a variety of projects. Our staff worked on two federal EIS documents, one for Naval Weapons Station Earle in Colts Neck, New Jersey, and one for the Pittsburgh International Airport and our staff has prepared a number of EIS documents for residential subdivisions in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Our staff has prepared Environmental Assessments for a number of public schools and a prison expansion in New Jersey under the requirements of E.O. 215.
Habitat Studies
Our professionals have decades of experience with designing and conducting aquatic and terrestrial habitat studies. W&E's staff have conducted fisheries and/or macroinvertebrate studies in PA, NJ, ND, NY and SD. Their experience with assessing aquatic habitats encompasses pond, stream, river, fresh and saltwater systems. The studies completed were in support of NPDES permit requirements, ecological risk assessments and assessing the presence or absence of ecological impacts for enforcement actions. W&E's professionals have designed and conducted numerous qualitative and quantitative terrestrial vegetation studies in PA, DE and NJ. Many of those studies included delineating/mapping distinct plant communities on large tracts of land. Some of the terrestrial habitat studies were in support of assessing the presence of absence of ecological impacts on CERCLA sites or developing habitat management plans and non-native plant management strategies.
Threatened and Endangered Species
Our staff has surveyed hundreds of acres of land for rare, threatened and endangered plant species and for rare and unique plant communities. Our staff were responsible for documenting the second confirmed occurrence of Tomanthera aruiculata, a plant recognized as endangered in Pennsylvania.
Ecological Engineering
Our philosophical approach for ecological engineering projects is rooted in two principals. The first is conceiving designs that use the examples that are readily apparent in nature, in other words, to mimic the way systems in nature have self designed. The second is to create designs that enhance and maximize the utility of the natural processes that exist in the natural system we are engineering. W&E has designed many different natural water treatment systems, including ones for treating stormwater, domestic waste water, industrial waste water, landfill leachate, and a variety of passive acid mine/rock drainage treatment systems. W&E's has prepared many conceptual designs, construction cost estimates, operations & maintenance plans and operating costs estimates for a wide variety of natural treatment systems. We have maintained and monitored the performance of those systems and when monitoring results dictate, we have adapted the maintenance of those natural systems to improve there function.
Construction Management and Oversight
Our staff have provided construction oversight on large scale wetland restoration projects and for some small scale stormwater treatment and control measures. W&E generally provides construction oversight and management when our designs are implemented/constructed. Our view is that the designer and the contractor must work as a team during construction. We fully understand that using mathematical models to design/engineer a functional and sustainable natural system is in reality an approximation of that natural system. We know that no matter how sophisticated the models there are going to be minor changes that occur during construction. Our goal is to achieve the overall intent/purpose of the design, and to minimize change orders by working with contractors that understand the working conditions and can effectively execute the critical design components.
Expert Testimony
W&E has prepared expert reports and provided expert testimony at the federal, state and local level.
Spill Response
Our Staff have worked on a number of spills, working as SCAT lead, collecting environmental samples to document presence or absence of the spilled compound (fingerprint analysis), and reviewing shoreline segments to obtain agency sign-off that a segment of shoreline has been adequately cleaned.
The staff at W&E has assessed and delineated thousands of acres of wetlands and miles of stream channel. W&E's staff has had many of our delineations confirmed by regulatory agencies. W&E has conducted many stream impact assessments and perennial, intermittent and ephemeral stream determinations. W&E personnel are experienced in the use of sub-meter GPS equipment for resource mapping, having used the equipment since 1994. In the office our staff are well versed and highly skilled in the use of ESRI’s ArcGIS software for mapping resources and depicting project components. W&E staff have completed wetlands delineations in DE, IL, ME, NC, NJ, NY, OH, PA and VA.
Wetlands Functional Assessment
Our staff are certified to perform wetland functions and values assessments and have used a variety of the methodologies that have been developed over the years to compare existing wetlands to designs for restored, enhanced or create wetlands; to assess the cumulative impacts of a proposed project, and as a guide to minimize overall wetland impacts on large linear projects. W&E regularly uses the following functions and values assessment methodologies:
- Wetlands Evaluation Technique (WET)
- Wetland Replacement Evaluation Procedure (WREP)
- Evaluation for Planned Wetlands (EPW)
- Hydrogeomorphic Approach to Assessing Wetland Functions (HGM)
Ecological Restoration
W&E staff are experts in the field of ecological restoration, having designed many acres of wetlands, including tidal and non-tidal wetlands. Our staff have designed, permitted and overseen the construction of hundreds of acres of wetlands that were created, restored and/or enhanced. Many of our ecological restoration projects were for replacing wetlands that were impacted by a permitted activity. We have worked on wetland mitigation banks and management plans for large tracts of land where our clients sought to remove non-native invasive plants introduce a sustainable native plant community. Our staff have been involved with wetlands restoration projects of regional significance. Staff at W&E were the owner's representative at the Richard P. Kane Wetlands Mitigation Bank, in Moonachie, New Jersey, the largest wetlands mitigation bank ever undertaken in New Jersey.
- Tidal Marsh
- Freshwater Wetlands
- Sustainable Ponds
- Terrestrial Habitat
Natural Resources Banking
W&E provides full service assessment, market analysis and design services for natural resource bank projects of all kinds. Our staff have prepared concepts for a number of proposed wetlands mitigation banks, including the development of concept plans for endangered species banks in Pennsylvania and New York. Our staff were the owner's representative at the Richard P. Kane Wetlands Mitigation Bank in Moonachie, New Jersey, the largest wetlands mitigation bank ever undertaken in New Jersey.
Ecological Risk Assessment
W&E's professionals are experts in the practice area of Ecological Risk Assessment. Our staff have prepared a wide variety of work plans, sampling and analysis plans, and quality assurance/quality control plans for all manner of ecological risk investigations. Our experts have been performing ecological risk based work and preparing ecological risk documents since the early 1990s when EPA began requiring Ecological Evaluations during the RI/FS process for CERCLA sites. Our professionals have designed and executed studies for investigating ecological risks in freshwater streams and rivers, ponds, tidal marsh (fresh and saltwater), wetlands and a variety of terrestrial habitats. W&E negotiated a risk based cleanup level for creek sediments impacted by a former manufactured gas plant. W&E staff have performed ecological risk assessment work in IL, MA, ND, NJ, NY, PA, SD, VA, and WA. Our staff have designed studies to investigate potential ecological risks, overseen and executed the field investigations and prepared final reports to document findings of under the following programs:
- Ecological Risk Assessment in accordance with USEPA's CERCLA and RCRA regulations
- State I Ecological Screening/Stage II Ecological Risk Characterization in accordance with Massachusetts Contingency Plan regulations
- Ecological Evaluations/Ecological Risk Assessments in accordance with New Jersey's Site Remediation Program regulations
- Fish and Wildlife Impact Analysis in accordance with New York DEC's regulations
- Evaluation of Ecological Receptors/Ecological Risk Assessment in accordance with Pennsylvania's Act 2 regulations
Natural Resource Damage Assessment
W&E provides full service Natural Resource Damage Assessment, assessing a wide variety of natural resources, including valuing damaged resources and valuing the uplift from proposed damage offset projects, using Visual HEA software. Our staff have worked on a variety of projects that had surface water and wetland impacts. Our staff have been called upon to value natural resource uplift projects that were proposed in Illinois, Maine and New Jersey and they have compared the value of the ecological uplift from those proposed restoration, preservation and enhancement projects.
Stormwater Management
W&E has considerable experience with a wide variety of Stormwater Control Measures (SCMs). In 2007, W&E worked with Temple University's Center for Sustainable Communities on the Pennypack Creek Watershed Act 167 Plan for improving the management of stormwater in the Pennypack Creek watershed. The Plan identified over 150 SCM opportunities throughout the watershed and the Center retained W&E to conduct a field reconnaissance of each location, assess the feasibility of the recommended control measure, and then prepared a detailed cost estimate for each of the SCM opportunities that were identified. In 2008, W&E again worked with the Center to perform a similar scope of work for the Fort Washington Area Flooding and Transportation Improvement Study.
In addition to single site stormwater management, W&E has considerable experience with the NPDES Municipal Separate Storm Sewer System (MS4) permit program, having obtained permits, and set up the MS4 Permit programs for the first five year permit period for one county, four boroughs, and five townships. W&E also performs NPDES permit monitoring activities such as, benthic invertebrate sampling, water sampling and regulatory reporting. W&E has conducted over 450 stormwater infiltration tests on more than 65 sites, across six counties and in 35 different municipalities for the purpose of designing SCMs. In addition to designing green infrastructure, W&E conducts infiltration testing using double-ring and falling head test methods and is highly skilled in assessing and interpreting subsurface soil conditions and whether those conditions are appropriate for infiltrating stormwater.
Green Stormwater Infrastructure
W&E has been designing and building green stormwater infrastructure (GSI) since 2006. Our projects have included stormwater treatment wetlands, stormwater wet-ponds, stormwater infiltration trenches, stormwater infiltration galleries, bio-infiltration/bio-retention basins and swales, and rain gardens. In 2006, W&E designed, permitted and constructed four SCMs demonstration projects with the Temple-Villanova Sustainable Stormwater Initiative (www.t-vssi.org) at Pennypack Ecological Restoration Trust in southern Montgomery County, PA. In 2007, W&E assisted Huntingdon Valley Country Club in obtaining a Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection Growing Greener grant for the design, permitting and installation of a 300+ foot long stormwater infiltration trench on the Club's property along Paper Mill Road, in Upper Moreland Township, Montgomery County, PA.In 2016 we designed and constructed an approximately one-acre stormwater treatment wetland (STW) on The College Settlement of Philadelphia's Camp property, in Horsham Township, Montgomery County, PA. This project was completed for Pennypack Ecological Restoration Trust using a National Fish and Wildlife Foundation grant from the Delaware River Restoration Fund.
In 2018, W&E completed work on a stormwater basin retrofit and bio-infiltration/bio-retention swales at the Upper Moreland Township School District's Middle School and Elementary School complex, with MRNenvironmental, Inc. W&E designed the GSI for MRNenvironmental, Inc. using Growing Greener grant funds obtained from Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection. This GSI will be used by the School District to teach a number of environmental education lessons and a variety of mathematical lessons.
Environmental Permitting
W&E has prepared applications and obtained permits for projects in DE, NC, NJ, NY, PA and VA. We have extensive experience with obtaining 404 Permits from the US Army Corps of Engineers. In many states there are Joint Permit programs where the state and Corps issue a single Joint Permit. W&E has applied for and obtained many Waivers and General and Individual permits from Pennsylvania's Joint Permit program and New Jersey's assumed Freshwater Wetlands program, where they issue permits on behalf of the Corps. W&E has also obtained permits from New Jersey's Waterfront Development, Coastal Wetlands, CAFRA, Flood Hazard Area, and Highlands programs. W&E has also applied for and obtained environmental permits for a wide array of other activities including but not limited to, permits for new and maintenance dredging, NJPDES and NPDES permits for stormwater discharges, etc.
Dredge Material Management
W&E's professionals have developed and implemented numerous sediment material sampling and analysis plans for dredging projects in Delaware River, New Jersey's Inner Coastal Waterways, the Arthur Kill and a creek in South Dakota. Our staff have extensive experience with managing a wide variety of dredge projects, from increasing the depth of a pond to cleaning out navigation channels and berths. W&E has obtained permits for dredge projects ranging from as small as 2,200 CY to as large as 107,000 CY. Our professionals are very familiar with a number of different dewatering technologies (including add-mixtures and geo-tubes). W&E has prepared detailed disposal and reuse plans and dredging/dewatering specifications. In addition to the investigation and management of dredge material, our staff has prepared feasibility plans, conceptual designs and permits for the beneficial reuse of the dredge material from a number of projects in New Jersey including one project that involved 8,500,000 CY.
Environmental Assessment and Environmental Impact Statement
The staff at W&E have prepared numerous Categorical Exclusion Evaluations, Environmental Impact Assessments and Environmental Impact Statements for a variety of projects. Our staff worked on two federal EIS documents, one for Naval Weapons Station Earle in Colts Neck, New Jersey, and one for the Pittsburgh International Airport and our staff has prepared a number of EIS documents for residential subdivisions in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Our staff has prepared Environmental Assessments for a number of public schools and a prison expansion in New Jersey under the requirements of E.O. 215.
Habitat Studies
Our professionals have decades of experience with designing and conducting aquatic and terrestrial habitat studies. W&E's staff have conducted fisheries and/or macroinvertebrate studies in PA, NJ, ND, NY and SD. Their experience with assessing aquatic habitats encompasses pond, stream, river, fresh and saltwater systems. The studies completed were in support of NPDES permit requirements, ecological risk assessments and assessing the presence or absence of ecological impacts for enforcement actions. W&E's professionals have designed and conducted numerous qualitative and quantitative terrestrial vegetation studies in PA, DE and NJ. Many of those studies included delineating/mapping distinct plant communities on large tracts of land. Some of the terrestrial habitat studies were in support of assessing the presence of absence of ecological impacts on CERCLA sites or developing habitat management plans and non-native plant management strategies.
Threatened and Endangered Species
Our staff has surveyed hundreds of acres of land for rare, threatened and endangered plant species and for rare and unique plant communities. Our staff were responsible for documenting the second confirmed occurrence of Tomanthera aruiculata, a plant recognized as endangered in Pennsylvania.
Ecological Engineering
Our philosophical approach for ecological engineering projects is rooted in two principals. The first is conceiving designs that use the examples that are readily apparent in nature, in other words, to mimic the way systems in nature have self designed. The second is to create designs that enhance and maximize the utility of the natural processes that exist in the natural system we are engineering. W&E has designed many different natural water treatment systems, including ones for treating stormwater, domestic waste water, industrial waste water, landfill leachate, and a variety of passive acid mine/rock drainage treatment systems. W&E's has prepared many conceptual designs, construction cost estimates, operations & maintenance plans and operating costs estimates for a wide variety of natural treatment systems. We have maintained and monitored the performance of those systems and when monitoring results dictate, we have adapted the maintenance of those natural systems to improve there function.
Construction Management and Oversight
Our staff have provided construction oversight on large scale wetland restoration projects and for some small scale stormwater treatment and control measures. W&E generally provides construction oversight and management when our designs are implemented/constructed. Our view is that the designer and the contractor must work as a team during construction. We fully understand that using mathematical models to design/engineer a functional and sustainable natural system is in reality an approximation of that natural system. We know that no matter how sophisticated the models there are going to be minor changes that occur during construction. Our goal is to achieve the overall intent/purpose of the design, and to minimize change orders by working with contractors that understand the working conditions and can effectively execute the critical design components.
Expert Testimony
W&E has prepared expert reports and provided expert testimony at the federal, state and local level.
Spill Response
Our Staff have worked on a number of spills, working as SCAT lead, collecting environmental samples to document presence or absence of the spilled compound (fingerprint analysis), and reviewing shoreline segments to obtain agency sign-off that a segment of shoreline has been adequately cleaned.
For further information please feel free to contact us via email at info@wetlandsandecology.com