Name:
Office:
Practice Area:
Environmental liability reduction, management, risk transfer, and litigation support.
Areas of expertise:
Hydrogeology as it relates to environmental remediation, sustainability, and EHS compliance
About Me in 140 Characters:
Married for nearly 40 years, father of five, grandfather of four, soon to be five. Bachelors in Geology and a Masters in Hydrology, from Minnesota and Arizona respectively.
Favorite Thing About Being a Hydrogeology Practitioner:
Working with the wide variety of people in our company. It’s interesting, rewarding, and challenging.
How did you get started in environmental health and safety?
It started with a love of science and the outdoors.
When I was a freshman in high school, my school counselor met with me and asked me what I would be doing after I graduated. I told him I was going into accounting or finance, and he asked me what I actually liked doing. I discussed my outdoor hobbies and interests and he asked, "Why do you want to go into accounting?" My answer was "Because my brothers were in the financial field and they had jobs, and having a job was very important in my family." He asked me to think about starting a career more closely aligned with my interests. This was the first step toward working in environmental consulting.
Then, in college, I received an opportunity that many would say was because of “luck.”
My brother says that luck is really an acronym: Laboring Under Certain Knowledge. While something can seem lucky, it all comes down to putting yourself in a good position to seize opportunities when they come by.
When I was a freshman in college I took an earth science class, and during a lecture, the professor described the field of hydrogeology. I was interested, and I went up to him after the large auditorium class was over and introduced myself. I asked, “Are there jobs in hydrogeology? Is that a field that has promise for employment?” He just responded, “Yes.”
About two weeks later when I was leaving the class he said, “Hey, you!” and I thought, “What have I done wrong? Was I sleeping in class or talking too much?” I met him at the front of the room and he told me that the U.S. Geological Survey was looking for a hydrologic field assistant for a summer project. He only told me because I had expressed my interest in hydrology two weeks prior.
That led me to be employed by them for the next five years and into graduate school. I ended up working for the central region research center in Denver for my Masters. This opportunity arose from a casual conversation and led to me being gainfully employed for most of my adult life.
How has the field changed since you began your career?
At the beginning of my career, water was taken for granted for its quality and availability in most areas of the United States. Now, water is in the news every day of the week because of impacts to its quality from human activity, scarcity due to demand, or climate change. Water as a resource is much more focused on now than it ever was when I started.
From a regulatory and commercial point of view, water went from having a purely compliance-focused response to a more long-term, resource planning focus, which is reflected in our focus on sustainability and environmental, health, and safety compliance practices here at Antea Group.
Many of the massive changes surrounding water and environmental protection in general, like the Superfund program, the extension of the Clean Air Act, and other dramatic shifts in environmental regulation happened right as I was starting my career. I think it is extremely important for the next generation of EHS professionals to remember where we came from and what it took to get here.
What are you most looking forward to?
At this point in my career, I’ve been preparing my colleagues to affect changes within Antea Group, Inogen, and other facets of our organization. I am looking forward to seeing the contributions and dynamics of all of my colleagues who will be taking on leadership roles within these organizations, and I’m anticipating the successes and contributions that they will make toward a bright future. To put it another way: I’m excited to see how well they pick up the baton as a group. After all, the individual is unlikely to achieve success individually.
What is your favorite thing about environmental liability management?
Learning. I enjoy learning from the people that I work with as well as learning from opportunities to work on technical topics and subjects that I have limited knowledge of and expanding my understanding of those topics.
Many of the sites that I work on are like intricate puzzles, with needs in solving environmental liability issues or support in litigation cases involving forensic environmental science. Several sites have histories that date back to the 1800s. I’ve worked on sites that were black plague burial grounds as well as sites that once housed WWII ammunition factories. The opportunity to understand the industrial practices that lead to the site's current environmental status lets me expand my knowledge of history, industry, materials, people, and culture.
What is the most interesting project you have ever worked on?
There are so many. The most interesting groups of projects are the ones where a water supply has been impacted and I’ve been able to participate in providing the solution to the drinking water impact and helping improve the safety in people's lives. These impacts go all the way from a rural family in eastern Tennessee to the water supply for half a million people and everything in-between. I really feel the impact of my work when I’m doing something that can directly affect what comes out of someone’s tap that they rely on every day.
What have you enjoyed about the places you've visited?
Europe is my favorite for the history. I’m a huge history nut, and the recorded history of Europe never ceases to intrigue me and spur on my curiosity and investigation. Latin America and Asia are also interesting, for their unique cultural dynamics and natural beauty. It’s great to go there and experience something totally new.
I have come away from international travel with amazing experiences, but also the sense of gratefulness for the benefits that come from living where I do.
When you were a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up?
A wildlife photographer.
Is there something unique that people might not know about you?
I’m a pretty open person so most people would know everything. But… Paella is my favorite food. Strangely enough, I first tried it in France, which is unusual, since it is a Spanish dish. I had it at a Spanish restaurant in Paris on Boulevard Haussmann.
What historical or fictional character would you most like to work with?
Charles Darwin, for his inquisitiveness, and because he opened up new frontiers of knowledge and wasn’t afraid to rock the boat.
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