These days you see companies bending over backward to attract new hires. Puffy job descriptions, promises of success, big salaries, and benefits are everywhere. My advice is to learn about a company’s leaders — not yet retiring and not a young professional. What they talk about during interviews is often a good indication of what they are like and what they value. It has always helped guide me to work somewhere rewarding under the tutelage of remarkable people.
Mike McLaughlin is the Senior Vice President of Environmental Services for SCS Engineers and was once an SCS young professional. He graduated from law school in 1979 and continues to influence people and businesses every day, including many at SCS Engineers.
He is an environmental engineer with a law degree, and you’d be hard-pressed to find a more knowledgeable person in the field. You’d also be lucky to know him. He is as entertaining as thoughtful about finding practical solutions to environmental challenges and the things that matter.
Just reading the article A Special Place to Study Law makes me happy knowing I get to work with people like Mike, and you could too.
Since 1977, WomenShelter of Long Beach has helped thousands of families overcome the trauma caused by domestic abuse. WSLB assists victims and their children by providing safe housing and supportive services, including an emergency shelter, 24-hour crisis hotline, counseling, social services support, legal and health advocacy, and much more.
SCS Engineers adopted four families in our 5th year of sponsorship. We provide gift cards for each family and hope we can go back to shopping and wrapping gifts for them next year. We wish our families and all a happy holiday season!
More community support in 2021 here.
SCSeTools® – Developed by Landfill Gas Practitioners for Landfill Owners and Operators
The Birth of LFG Data Tracking
In the early 2000s tracking landfill gas data at facilities was anything but uniform, organized, or secure. The industry was using various methods to track data on paper forms and logbooks, then transferring it by hand into spreadsheets. Some of us used desktop database applications, but as the saying goes, necessity is the mother of invention.
From an SCS employee’s idea for demonstrating how to use landfill gas monitoring data to analyze and pinpoint system corrections, SCS DataServices® was born. In the span of several months, a team of SCS’s landfill engineers, field technicians, and technology gurus worked with client-needs to create a concept application visualizing collected landfill data on maps. Our staff field-tested it with good results, and SCS Field Services began using the application to visualize issues with wellfields that aren’t readily apparent when looking at spreadsheets.
A large SCS landfill client had seen our field staff using DataServices, asked if SCS would consider providing them with access to the application on a subscription basis. Our team adapted DataServices, added features, and continued improvements tailored for the client’s use.
As soon as secure data transfer became feasible, SCS moved to an Internet-based solution for our landfill gas practitioners. The platform called SCSeTools® holds the data collected by SCS DataServices®.
Applications and features roll out as we continually update and upgrade, incorporating ideas and improvements from our users and staff along the way. DataServices is addressing the landfill gas management needs of over 600 landfills across the US and Canada in 2021.
The keys to success follow our mission and values of maintaining close communications with our clients, field staff, engineers, and eTools support staff (all landfill gas practitioners), with the help of software engineers. Technology companies are not up at night thinking about landfill operations, but we are.
We introduce our SCS eTools landfill technology capabilities and a few of the creative and talented SCSers behind the technology in the next segment. Our speakers walk you through demonstrations of how over one-third of the landfill owners and operators in North America are increasing efficiencies using SCS eTools.
Visualizing Landfill Challenges – Shortcuts to Keeping Your Wellfield in Balance
DataServices shows the entire wellfield for any monitored parameters and zooms in on troublesome areas or wells. Results can be as simple or detailed as the landfill owners’ environmental and business needs dictate. The detailed examples here illustrate how graphs, maps, and charts help keep the wellfield in balance. We link each challenge to the description of a video demonstration.
In balance means extracting more gas for renewable energy, preventing odors and methane migration, keeps subsurface and surface conditions and workers safe. The information can help diagnose equipment conditions before they become costly, maintain regulatory compliance, and support cost estimates if the landfill is expanding or more infrastructure investment or equipment is needed.
Looking at vacuum distribution across a gas collection system – Select the system pressure map, which highlights vacuum distribution across the wellfield to show the wells with good (expected) vacuum, pressure drop over distance, and any wells unexpectantly losing vacuum. Zooming in and changing the vacuum ranges further enhances where to assign staff to troubleshoot any identified issues.
Using a methane distribution map shows whether the wells are tuned to where the landfill owner wants them. Wells may be identified below the targeted range, indicating slight over pulling; a technician can use this map to identify such issues and quickly check the identified wells. Wells identified above the desired methane tuning range indicate wells not collecting enough gas, which has consequences. These wells can be the source of odors, leachate seeps, possible lateral migration to an out of waste probe. Not sending enough fuel to a power plant or atmospheric releases can affect surface emissions monitoring.
Managing liquids – Changing waste streams and more rainfall in certain areas of the country complicates liquids management. DataServices visualizes the impacts of liquids on wells and helps landfill owners better manage a proper liquids removal program. The program will let them know how many pumps to budget for and, over time, where to relocate well dewatering pumps so that they are most efficient at removing liquids from landfills.
High-BTU Gas Plants –Filter maps help users locate wells contributing to gas dilution into renewable energy plants. It can help create punch lists for landfill staff to investigate, troubleshoot and tune. As wellfield technicians make corrections, they show on the map in real-time.
Temperature and subsurface oxidation events – Some call the condition subsurface fires, but this is a serious issue for landfills. Over-pulling wells, damaged infrastructure, and other conditions can cause oxidation events. Using a combination of temperature Parameter Maps to review wellhead temperature distribution and a Points Chart feature provides a deeper dive into the data. It provides more insight into which well or wells may be contributing to the high-temperature issues.
Locating a specific well – That’s not so easy when hundreds of wells surround you and at larger landfills. DataServices had built-in filter features to identify a single monitoring point on a wellfield map easily.
Customizing for compliance, best practices, and rules – DataServices allows monitoring points across a single site to have customized rules for each monitoring point. Rules can be for regulatory purposes, standard operating procedures, best management practices, and even site-specific preferences or any combination thereof. It is efficient to customize rule application to landfills and collection points – meaning wells, probes or ports, horizontal collectors. This customization capability helps organize and confirm regulatory compliance. It is especially salient with the 2021 EPA and state compliance changes for a single landfill or an organization with hundreds of landfills.
MobileForms – Inspection forms, blower flare station monitoring forms, load tracking from municipalities, incoming hazardous waste tracking, MRF bale counts are examples of paperless entry available. The data feeds directly from mobile phones to the supervisor and into the maintenance department, so staff can start cataloging and looking at what’s going on in real-time at several types of facilities. It’s available for regulators and inspections and helps reduce staff hours tabulating and centralizing the information. Any information historically captured on a form or log attached to a clipboard can now be captured and stored electronically. From there, it can be recovered and produced as a PDF export file or data from the forms used to trend data and help make informed operational decisions.
MobileTools – DataServices in a condensed format suitable for mobile devices. Field staff use MobileTools to save time formerly used to return to the office, transfer/transcribe the collected data and upload it to a supervisor for quality checks before storage. Technicians can now recall the last 20 readings for any given well and review trend graphs on their phones or tablets while standing adjacent to the well they have questions about and need to access the data. MobileTools also allows them to upload field data such as liquid level readings while the data is being collected. The information instantly populates into DataServices and is available for review by others on the project team.
The most valuable tools are in development now for release in 2022. ARC GIS integration developed under SCS RMC® will further enhance DataServices with even better visualization and location capabilities and provide enhanced features such as allowing landfill owners to see their well as-built information and view subsurface information about their wells.
Learn more at SCS Engineers, where we adopt our clients’ environmental challenges as our own.
SCS Engineers is expanding its environmental expertise by hiring two professionals in its Raleigh, North Carolina office. Candy Elliott, a licensed professional geologist in various states on the east coast, brings 14 years of experience in brownfields, remediation, and site characterization. Candy is versed in aerobic/anaerobic monitored natural attenuation processes (including chemical oxidation and reduction, bioremediation via metabolic or cometabolic pathways), and the interpretation of indicator parameters. She has a comprehensive knowledge of geophysical techniques, geologic and hydrogeologic site assessment field experience with groundwater monitoring, reporting, and corrective action in multiple environments across seven states.
“Candy’s skill set diversifies not only the Raleigh office acumen but the services that we can provide existing and potential clients,” states Kenton Yang, the Raleigh office’s project director. “To be able to bring a professional on-board with her experience is exciting, and we look forward to what she can accomplish.”
SCS also welcomes Hammed Moshood, a recent graduate with a bachelor’s degree in Civil Engineering from Idaho State University. Hammed joins the Raleigh team as an Associate Professional supporting SCS’s clients with landfills, landfill gas, and other industrial clients. “We’re excited to bring on Hammed, a recent graduate, to continue providing cost-effective and efficient services to our clients,” says Ian Spurlock, a senior project professional in Raleigh.
As with all SCS Engineers employee-owners, these new professionals will continue engaging in industry associations and community education.
Grace attends Virginia Tech University, studying Civil Engineering, and will be graduating in 2022. We are thrilled to tell you that Grace has accepted a full-time position with SCS after graduation. Lindsay Evans of SCS Human Resources interviewed Grace to get an inside look at her thoughts about SCS’s Internship Program.
What is your title at SCS Engineers? Would you please describe your responsibilities at SCS?
My title at SCS is Intern Engineer. My responsibilities include assisting the SCS Midlothian, VA office on a variety of projects, including landfill engineering, landfill gas engineering, and mining engineering projects. I also have done a good amount of Construction Quality Assurance (CQA) out in the field. I do a lot of engineering work within Civil 3D and technical reporting for EPA and VDEQ involving landfill gas monitoring and data review.
What was your favorite part about our internship program?
My favorite part of the program is definitely the intern presentation day. Although it is certainly nerve-racking, I love being able to hear what all the other interns across the U.S. were involved in at SCS Engineers.
How would you describe our company culture?
The company culture at SCS is one of my most favorite parts of getting to work here. As an intern, I have the opportunity to be a part of a team with responsibilities and access to a plethora of resources within my Midlothian office and throughout the company. It’s awesome that all SCS personnel are willing to help from far and wide; everyone is just an MS-Teams call away. I’ve had incredible mentors at SCS who fostered an amazing learning and working environment for me.
What advice would you give to future interns at SCS?
My biggest piece of advice is never to be afraid to ask questions! As I said before, there are so many experienced professionals at SCS, and as interns, we should definitely take advantage of learning from them! Asking questions enabled me to grow and learn more than I would have had I not asked.
On what cool project have you worked?
I’ve gotten to work on tons of fun projects so far, but a notable one is using Leapfrog Works and 3D modeling. I take data given to me by either field personnel or the client and transform a model depicting gas wells within the landfill. It provides a visualization of liquid levels and obstructions to each well. This is cool because I also create surfaces from the interpolated liquid elevations, which gives a better understanding of where the liquid is most present within the landfill, which could indicate higher temperatures.
Do you feel that your work at SCS has made a difference in our environment?
It is fulfilling to know that the projects I work on, such as emissions management and monitoring, reporting, and communicating, positively affect the environment.
What have you learned the most in your internship?
I’ve certainly learned a lot being an intern at SCS since the summer of 2020. Something that sticks with me is that it’s crucial to be reliable and rely on others to collaborate and work cohesively on project teams. The best projects are successful due to the effectiveness of the project team behind them!
Our clients and SCSers are excited to have Grace, another amazing YP, join SCS Engineers as an Associate Professional!
If you are interested in the internship program at SCS for the 2022 summer, please visit SCS’s Careers page in December 2021 to apply.
Hydrogen sulfide (H2S) levels are creeping up at some landfills, especially those that take C&D waste; some are seeing concentrations in the thousands to 30,000 parts per million (up from about 20 to 40 ppm ten years ago). And even at very low concentrations, H2S can be problematic.
Material Recovery Facility residuals, which typically contain significant amounts of pulverized drywall, are high in gypsum and sulfate. Once broken down, residuals become a high-surface-area material, leaching into and spreading through waste. When reacting with water and organics, it can potentially generate H2S. With a drive to divert more C&D debris, and regulations tightening around H2S, operators’ jobs get harder as they work to stave off emissions from this corrosive, flammable compound notorious for its “rotten egg” odor.
When building out their gas collection systems, controlling H2S becomes even more daunting. Sol Sim, an SCS Engineers Vice President, explains, “We see H2S concentrations jump when we expand landfill gas collection systems, often in cells that contain C&D residual screening materials. The gas was there all along but sequestered. Now it’s coming out of the ground, and the onset of issues can spike suddenly.”
When spikes come on quickly, Sim’s team implements turnkey interim treatment approaches. They start by identifying the gas collection wells with the highest contributors and act fast to get them into compliance.
SCS teams take a two-pronged approach by stepping back and thinking about the big picture while taking action. It provides a major advantage to moving too quickly.
The more data, the better. Your engineers can simulate treatment with various media to assess the impact on flare inlet concentrations. And knowing potential impact at the flare is critical; it’s the compliance point where regulators measure sulfur dioxide (SO2) emissions.
SO2 can’t be controlled through combustion, so removing H2S from waste before sending gas to the flare is essential. Sim thinks back to problems he’s investigated for clients who had SO2 sneak up on them, causing failed sulfur dioxide emissions testing.
The proactive measure of identifying problematic gas wells and treating them is key to staying in compliance. And Sim often finds clients using interim solutions as long as they can. He has seen them work well for up to five years but they don’t resolve operators’ long-term issues, which will become more challenging as our waste streams continue to change or as landfills continue to accept more and more C&D materials.
“We solve immediate issues, address the impact of incoming materials several years in advance, and begin planning for the next 20 years. It’s how we determine strategies to minimize emissions and improve efficiencies into the future with consideration to needs as landfilling and recycling evolve.”
“We’re going to investigate thoroughly to pinpoint and understand the cause, but we do take immediate action in the interim. As part of the solution, we’ll develop an informed strategy to prevent issues well into the future,” he says.
For the longer haul, it takes time to get building permits. Coming up with permanent engineering designs and treatments requires a lot of troubleshooting and research. Even once engineers identify a lasting fix, it takes time to manufacture and install larger vessels and other infrastructure.
But they don’t wait for all these pieces to come together to act.
The priority is getting operators in compliance right away or taking down emissions if they are on the verge of noncompliance. As work begins, operators can breathe a little easier knowing they have time to figure out how to allocate resources and funds to implement a more permanent strategy.
“We’ve seen where data we’ve gathered while working on the immediate problem enables our clients to gain insight to make good decisions around rightsizing their infrastructure moving forward,” Sim says.
Watch and study while addressing the immediate problem.
Sim emphasizes that operators should not be surprised or act too quickly when they turn on the gas extraction system and see spikes in H2S concentrations. There is usually an initial spike from a new high H2S producing area at the onset of gas collection. He has seen operators abruptly stop extracting, which can lead to odors or other compliance issues.
“When you put in a treatment system, you can take out the initial surge in H2S to allow time for the concentrations to level out. It’s important to allow that window for initial surges to run their course to understand the problem better. Otherwise, you could over-design your system around a short-term event,” Sim advises.
He points to a real-life scenario: a site that skipped the interim step of starting with a less expensive initial solution. Once they started drawing on the gas, they realized the problem was not as substantial as originally thought, and they didn’t need a multi-million-dollar system in the end.
A balancing act.
“Imagine H2S generation as an expanding balloon; if you pop it, air rushes out fast [akin to when you first pull gas from the ground]. That concentration level scares people. But if you react by shutting off extraction points, your balloon will continue to expand and eventually create odor problems. The goal is to extract the gas and H2S at the rate it is being generated, so it’s a balancing act, where expertise and technology both play key roles,” Sim says.
Early work typically begins by identifying wells that are the highest contributors and concentrating efforts there. It’s a complex process as sites can have fifty to thousands of collection points. Having the historical data and saving the data to watch the trend makes identifying and analyzing specific wells or clusters much more efficient.
Successfully attacking those high offenders requires an understanding of flow and concentrations. After locating the problem area, Sim takes samples using Dräger tubes at strategic points throughout individual wells and headers to identify concentrations. Gas well monitoring and the corresponding flow data will tell you if you’ve taken emissions down sufficiently.
More Resources:
SCSeTools Landfill Data Monitoring and Analysis
Staying Ahead of Odor Management at Solid Waste Facilities
On September 15, Governor Pritzker signed Senate Bill 2408, forming the Illinois Energy Transition Act. The Act advances renewable energy goals and the path to carbon-free electricity generation by 2045. To say this bill will impact the Illinois electrical utility landscape is an understatement.
Illinois is a top energy producer and consumer in the upper Midwest. The Act requires displacement of more than 6,000 MWh provided from coal and natural gas. One average MWh is enough to power 796 homes for a year in the U.S.
Energy efficiencies and implementing alternative energy resources will be an increasingly important strategy to mitigate the cost impacts from this Act to all users: residential, commercial, industrial, and municipal.
SCS supports clients with the decommissioning and legacy management of coal-fired facilities and renewable energy development. Our environmental team in Illinois includes local experts, Scott Knoepke and Richard Southorn who support the management of coal-fired facilities with Coal Combustion Residuals (CCR) and assist utilities transitioning to renewable natural gas installments and solar energy sources. For coal-fired facilities with CCR impoundments, SCS’s Illinois Office provides design, closure, construction quality assurance, and site stewardship (e.g., long-term maintenance, groundwater monitoring, and reporting).
SCS uses a specialized team for solar implementation on landfills and Brownfields. Knoepke and Southorn are supported by SCS National Experts in the region to assess and implement Solar Energy on Landfills & Brownfields.
The Act defines that landfill gas produced in Illinois as a renewable energy resource. SCS Engineers has one of the longest and most successful Biogas practices in the United States. SCS designs, constructs, and operates more Biogas, Anaerobic Digestion, Renewable Natural Gas, Ag Digester systems than any other engineering firm in the nation. Our clients attribute our quality and high production rates to our practice specializing in waste gas utilization, combined with our expertise in solid waste management and compliance.
New Chicago office location at 40 Shuman Boulevard, Suite 216, Naperville, IL 60563
SCS Engineers continues expanding its environmental team in its Chicago, Illinois office to meet environmental engineering and consulting needs focusing on waste management and the needs of the electric utilities. Driving demands are industries and municipalities seeking to reduce their environmental footprint while providing essential services and products.
Leading the Chicagoland team, Professional Engineer and Professional Geologist Scott Knoepke. Knoepke serves clients needing remediation and site redevelopment. This includes commercial dry cleaners, retail petroleum sites, and heavy industries such as steel, rail, coal, mining, manufacturing, metal cutting, and plating.
Meet the Crew!
Richard Southorn, PE, PG, with 20 years of experience, joins Knoepke supporting solid waste and electric utility sectors. Southorn began his career in the field performing CQA oversight, environmental monitoring, and soil core/rock core logging at landfill sites. He moved into landfill design and modeling, primarily to support landfill expansion projects. Richard has extensive experience with site layouts, geotechnical stability, stormwater management, and leachate generation analyses.
Brett Miller is a Senior Designer with over 20 years of experience and proficiency in AutoCAD Civil 3D and Maya. Brett is capable of any production drafting and is highly skilled in understanding 3D space. This helps him support designs that fit into site-specific, real-world environments. Brett also creates 3D models and animations that illustrate the benefits of a design to our clients.
Niko Villanueva, PE, joins SCS with eight years of experience. Niko provides engineering and drafting support and is experienced in designing various landfill systems such as stormwater management, leachate and gas control, and foundation analysis. He has also prepared cost estimates and construction bid quantities for various projects and construction quality assurance services at multiple facilities.
Meet Spencer LaBelle, with six years of experience. Spencer provides solutions for stormwater-related projects, including stormwater management system design, permitting, and compliance. He provides a diverse portfolio of clients and industries with stormwater-related services and environmental compliance.
Zack Christ, PE, comes to SCS with 15 years of experience in solid waste and CCR landfill sectors. Zack has experience performing CQA oversight and CQA management of landfill final cover, base liner, and GCCS; environmental monitoring; and logging soil borings. He also has extensive landfill design and CAD experience in developing landfill siting and permitting application projects. Zack’s areas of expertise include geotechnical analyses, stormwater management, leachate management design, GCCS design, and cost estimating.
Most everyone is familiar with IIAR2, the American National Standard for Safe Design of Closed-Circuit Ammonia Refrigeration Systems. They will refer to it as the Recognized and Generally Accepted Good Engineering Practice (RAGAGEP) for our industry.
People often forget that IIAR2 is merely the RAGAGEP for the design of ammonia refrigeration systems, but not the installation. IIAR4-2020 is the current RAGAGEP for the installation of ammonia refrigeration systems. If we look through IIAR4, we find that it does, in fact, prohibit the practice of using sheet metal screws when installing insulation.
Section 8.1.11 states, “Screws, rivets, or any other jacket securement device that could pierce the underlying vapor retarder shall not be used. Only bands and seals shall be used to secure the jacketing.”
Approved
The EPA issued a newly approved alternative test method (ALT-143) for compliance with the enhanced monitoring provisions in the National Emission Standards for Hazardous Air Pollutants (NESHAPs) for MSW Landfills (40 CFR 63 Subpart AAAA updated March 26, 2020). The approved alternative method instead of Method 10 allows for direct monitoring of CO at a landfill gas well using a portable gas analyzer. The NESHAP requires weekly monitoring of CO at the landfill gas well if the gas temperature is over 145F and the regulatory agency has approved no higher operating value under the NSPS/EG rules or NESHAPs. The Solid Waste Working Group (SWWG) coordinated with landfill gas meter manufacturers (QED, Elkins Earthworks) to prepare this method.
EIL approved sharing a flow chart and Excel file that can be used for monitoring/documentation purposes when using this approved alternative “field instrument method.” Don’t hesitate to get in touch with your SCS air emissions/compliance expert or contact us at for details.
EPA will post the alternative test method to the Broadly Applicable Approved Alternative Test Methods | US EPA website page. Take note that the hyperlink in EPA’s letter is out of date.
Pending Approval
The Solid Waste Working Group (SWWG) also submitted two alternative methods in lieu of Method 10 to EPA for approval using grab sample (canister, foil bag) and laboratory analysis, one with GC/FID and the other GC/TCD instrumentation. The SWWG coordinated with several national laboratories on the methods. EPA is completing its review of the two proposed methods, anticipating EPA approval before September 27, 2021, the effective date of the enhanced monitoring provisions.
