Key Personnel
Bruce Smith, PG
Mr. Smith has over 30 years experience in the environmental industry as a professional hydrologist, and over 15 years as a professional geologist. Mr. Smith’s experience encompasses a broad range of environmental hydrological applications and investigations including those associated with energy development, surface water and groundwater hydrology, watershed studies, water rights applications, water supply and treatment, contaminant hydrology at industrial facilities, active mine operations, abandoned mine lands, and solid-waste management. Mr. Smith has extensive working knowledge and experience in assessing water quality and chemistry, groundwater/surface water interactions, aquifer contaminant distributions, the measurement and interpretation of unsaturated zone hydrogeologic data, and parameter estimation for groundwater modeling. He has conducted numerous projects involving design, implementation, and interpretation of water quality data in surface and groundwater. Mr. Smith has designed several passive water treatment systems for mine water drainage (acidic and alkaline conditions) and evaluated options for disposal of waters generated during energy exploration and development. Mr. Smith is also formally trained in wetlands delineation. Mr. Smith has specific experience addressing the environmental issues confronting industry within the Piceance Basin in western Colorado. He was responsible for managing and directing site activities at two large oil shale operations under temporary cessation. In addition, he has been responsible for the design and oversight of actions to mitigate environmental impacts resulting from energy exploration and development as well as management of data collected to support oil shale development efforts. Mr. Smith has been a technical leader and project manager on numerous complex hydrogeologic site characterization projects that have involved contaminant delineation and numerical groundwater flow and transport modeling. Specific work experience includes the design and implementation of comprehensive site characterizations including design, installation, and permitting of groundwater monitoring wells, unsaturated zone instrumentation, sampling and analysis of water and soils, bedrock characterization, hydraulic testing and analysis, radioisotopic age dating, areal recharge estimation using environmental tracers, and the development and application of saturated/unsaturated groundwater flow and transport models. Mr. Smith has broad experience in project management encompassing project planning, permitting, budget development, team assimilation, operation and maintenance, and facility closure issues. He has extensive experience interfacing and negotiating with state and federal regulatory agencies including the U.S. EPA, U.S. BLM, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment. He has prepared work plans, final project and RI/FS reports, and Engineering Evaluation and Cost Analysis (EECA) reports and other documents.
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William Merrill, PG
Mr. Merrill has more than 30 years of technical and management experience in resolving environmental issues confronting industry and public lands managers in Colorado and eastern Utah. He has managed, technically directed, and performed numerous environmental programs involving surface water and groundwater hydrology, water resource management and protection, water rights, geochemical characterizations, human-health and ecological risk evaluation, land reclamation, facility and mine closure, stormwater management, and regulatory compliance. Mr. Merrill’s expertise is routinely used to develop and implement programs designed to assess the surface water and groundwater quality and quantity impacts resulting from proposed, present, and past operations conducted within the watershed. These programs typically involve one or more of the following tasks: (1) geochemical characterization of surface water, groundwater, soil, sediment, and biota; (2) flow monitoring; (3) consumptive use analysis; (4) stream depletion modeling; (5) human-health and ecological risk evaluation; and (6) development and analysis of appropriate mitigative measures. He has been responsible for assessing environmental impacts at active and inactive mine and mill sites, preparation of Engineering Evaluation/Cost Analysis documents, closure of RCRA-regulated units and solid waste management units, technical oversight of construction operations during reclamation, and implementation of RI/FS studies under CERCLA. Mr. Merrill is also skilled in providing the technical information needed to support surface water and storage water rights and plans for augmentation, including water supply evaluation, water demand requirements, historical consumptive use analysis, stream depletion impacts resulting from site operations (consumptive uses, water transfers, diversions), impacts to groundwater, reservoir surveys and volume calculations, replacement sources, and substitute water supply plans. Our clients routinely use Mr. Merrill’s regulatory compliance expertise and strong working relationships with regulatory agency personnel to develop and oversee compliance programs; properly apply NEPA requirements and applicable or relevant and appropriate requirement; and prepare the annual documentation required for stormwater management, plans for augmentation and substitute water supply plans, RCRA-permitted facilities, and mine permits. He is also skilled in stormwater management and served on work groups assembled by the CDPHE Water Quality Control Division to assist in the state’s implementation of the EPA’s NPDES Phase II Rule.
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