West Oxfordshire District Council (WODC) within the UK lately refused a planning software on the grounds of flood threat. The proposed growth included the development of only a single dwelling throughout the village of Standlake. Nevertheless, native campaigners had been in a position to argue towards the proposal with the advantage of groundwater degree knowledge offered by a steady degree logger that had been put in within the backyard of an adjoining property. Instrumentation agency OTT HydroMet writes.
On this case, the developer took occasional guide measurements that had been discovered to be of restricted worth as compared with steady readings from knowledgeable borehole logger from OTT HydroMet.
“The groundwater level data was critically important to our case,” explains native campaigner Paula Gaffney. “The village of Standlake is closely affected by flooding, so this can be a main consideration in any proposed new growth, however with out proof, it’s troublesome to attract dependable conclusions.
“For that reason, we dug two boreholes adjoining to the proposed growth website and rented an OTT ecoLog 1000 water degree logger from OTT HydroMet to take measurements mechanically each quarter-hour, 24/7.
“This generated a steady knowledge stream that offered a wealth of knowledge on native groundwater situations, significantly when mixed with rainfall knowledge from the close by Brize Norton meteorological station.
“Perhaps the most striking conclusion was the stark contrast between our continuous data stream and the developer’s occasional manual observations from the borehole that they had constructed in the middle of the proposed development site. In particular, the WODC Lowlands Planning Sub Committee were interested to note that the applicant’s water level observations did not coincide with any of the heavy rainfall events that took place.”
Standlake is situated alongside the River Windrush, near the purpose the place it joins the River Thames. Village residents have grow to be accustomed to common flooding, which is generally derived from rising groundwater. Drainage pipe ingress can also be an issue and Thames Water steadily provides tankers to assist alleviate flood harm. Nevertheless, Standlake is certainly not distinctive with its flood-related challenges and since their success in preventing the event software, the campaigners have been contacted by different villages looking for assist and recommendation on methods to deal with planning purposes in flood zones.
“Our recommendation is always to gather reliable data,” says Paula Gaffney. “The set up of the monitoring system was a lot simpler than we initially anticipated. Digging the boreholes was most likely the toughest half! The phone assist from OTT HydroMet was wonderful – serving to us to set the monitor to file the space from floor floor to the water, which was sometimes close to to zero, after heavy rain.
“Online access to the data via the Hydromet Cloud web portal provided by OTT Hydromet was also very useful. The ability to access real-time data in the cloud gave full and transparent data access to the WODC planning and drainage officers so that they could see the rapid rise of high water table events and the slow infiltration rate as ground water levels fell over several days.”
The OTT ecoLog 1000 contains a knowledge logger related by cable to a stainless-steel probe containing a really steady ceramic strain cell. The datalogger shops measurements domestically, but in addition transmits encrypted knowledge to an internet site that may be simply accessed by all stakeholders, offering clear entry to reliable knowledge.
Explaining the significance of information reliability, Paula says: “The installation of the ecoLog was simple and intuitive, but we were keen for OTT’s support engineers to check the configuration, so that it could be relied upon as evidence. This contrasted starkly with the applicant’s manually derived measurements, which were obviously selective and, in some cases, could be erroneous.”
Oxfordshire County Council’s drainage engineer visited the positioning and decided that the logger’s knowledge demonstrated the positioning to be exterior the tolerance required for efficient soakaways. He additionally famous the absence of readings by the applicant throughout or following flood occasions and steered that the applicant also needs to function an automated borehole logger.
Summarising, Paula says: “We were very impressed with the diligence of the WODC Lowlands Planning Sub Committee, and obviously delighted that the evidence we provided empowered them to determine that the proposed development would result in unacceptable flood risk. In fact, one of the councillors remarked that this was the first time an application had been refused on the grounds of flood risk.”
Typical customers of the OTT ecoLog 1000 embody authorities businesses, flood managers, builders, native communities, freeway managers, rail community operators, water corporations and water useful resource managers, in addition to consultants, lecturers and environmental researchers. Nevertheless, OTT HydroMet’s Dr Liam Goodes says: “Local weather change is growing the frequency and severity of utmost climate, so it appears probably that flood threat is about to grow to be a higher problem in planning and growth.
“Obviously, Planning decisions have to be informed by reliable facts, underpinned by accurate data. Groundwater levels can change quickly, so the OTT ecoLog offers all stakeholders, including councils, developers and local communities, an opportunity to create reliable evidence to ensure that planning decisions are fair and underpinned by science.”
