Former Gasworks Site

Catherine Greed has recently been working on a former gasworks site, reviewing previous reports to produce a remediation and redevelopment options appraisal.

Whilst the existing reports were all prepared by established companies and were of a reasonable quality, it never ceases to amaze us how many geo-environmental companies go through the motions of carrying out a conceptual site model (CSM), but do not actually think about the model and modify it, as new information comes to light.

On complicated sites, Ruddlesden geotechnical believes it is useful, arguably essential, to physically plot the data, both historical land use and then chemical testing, on plans, cross-sections and/ or sketches, to make sense of it, to identify what we know, and what we don’t know, so that appropriate recommendations can be provided.

On this particular site, whilst the historical gasworks had undoubtedly caused some relatively heavy PAH contamination of the ground, the waters were quite literally muddied by the site’s subsequent use as a council yard, which included vehicle servicing, washdown and refuelling areas.