Danish Companies to Map Groundwater in California

21 June 2017

California authorities will now focus on mapping the groundwater resources in order to make the water cache more sustainable. In that connection, there has been focus on Danish solutions and knowhow. This program has been developed based on a groundwater-mapping program throughout the past 15 years.

- The Danish business sector creates exceptional solutions for the management of water by cooperation between Danish companies. They focus on collecting solutions from different Danish suppliers in order to create a turnkey project (or, package solution) – even for great and complex projects in e.g. the US, said Mads Lebech CEO of the Danish Industry Foundation, who was a part of initiating the Water Technology Alliance (WTA).

Salty or Fresh?

- One of the numerous challenges that the authorities of California currently face is gaining an overview of the fresh groundwater and the water movement in the coastal areas where it compounds with the salty seawater. This challenge will be approached by Danish companies, and there will be focus on the managing of the fresh groundwater and the salty groundwater in a large area by Monterey Bay, Jacob Vind, head of the WTA, explains regarding one of the projects.

This project will be executed by the companies SkyTEM Surveys, from Aarhus, I-GIS, from Risskov and Ramboll, from Copenhagen. SkyTEM Surveys will map the Californian underground with advanced scanning equipment. I-GIS will provide 3D visualization software and Rambøll will deliver counselling and data analysis.

Sustainable Water Catchment

Another challenge in California, within the water field, is developing a better overview of the aquifers’ delimitation. Based on this, the second project focuses on advanced data management and ground-based geophysics by mapping the aquifers’ delimitation.

- Based on old and new data, we provide ‘incorporate interpretation’, which helps us gain a more detailed insight into the siting of the groundwater, Max Halkjær from Ramboll explains.

This project will be executed by Ramboll and I-GIS in corporation with a local consultant.

A Successful Export Approach

The WTA was established in 2015 with a purpose of disseminating knowledge about the Danish water model, and supporting the Danish water industry in the process of entering the American market.

Max Halkjær emphasizes the structure of the WTA and their export approach as a crucial element in relation to the successful Danish companies:

- A model has been established, where Danish water companies are represented in form of three permanent employees located in California, as a part of the Danish Trade Council. These employees are specialized within the water field and are determined to create cooperation. The California authorities are very interested in cooperating, which has created many opportunities.

The WTA collaboration is supported by the Danish Industry Foundation . Their experience in the California market with the WTA has been positive. Mads Lebech explains:

- Projects like these, where Danish companies jointly create system solutions, pose great potential. It is great to see specific projects which are eyed by the WTA collaboration in California, which we have supported in the past three years.

The Water Technology Alliance, an arm of the Danish Trade Council in California consists of, Aarhus Vand, Kamstrup, Applied Biomimetic, Danfoss, Grundfos, Smith Innovation, DHI, AVK, LiqTech and Leif Koch A/S. And as previously mentioned, Rambøll, SkyTEM, and I-GIS.