SGE provides strategic environmental advisory services across the entire project lifecycle – from early-stage planning and permitting through execution, operation, and long-term monitoring. Acting as a dedicated Owner’s Engineer, we represent our clients’ environmental interests, ensuring that regulatory obligations and contractual commitments are met efficiently and with technical integrity.

Our advisory services are designed to safeguard both environmental and commercial outcomes, particularly in complex or elevated risk developments. We support the implementation and continuous adaptation of mitigation measures, control systems, and reporting frameworks as project conditions or regulatory requirements evolve.

Core services include:

• Lifecycle Environmental Oversight: Technical representation during design, construction, and operational phases to monitor environmental compliance, ensure quality standards, and identify emerging risks

• Risk-Informed Decision Support: Integration of environmental and technical risk assessments into project planning, design reviews, and procurement to align sustainability goals with project performance

• Regulatory and Permitting Strategy: Expert navigation through EU and national environmental permitting frameworks, including alignment with EIA requirements, liability provisions, and environmental sector-specific standards

• Stakeholder Representation: Serving as liaison between owners, regulators, contractors, and the public to ensure environmental responsibilities are clearly communicated and transparently fulfilled

• Performance Monitoring and Corrective Action Planning: Oversight of environmental monitoring programs, with proactive adjustment strategies to maintain compliance with environmental and contractual thresholds

With SGE as your environmental advisor, you gain a technically proficient partner focused on protecting your interests while strengthening the environmental performance and credibility of your project.

A comprehensive Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) is essential for evaluating how a proposed development may interact with its environmental and socio-economic context. Beyond meeting regulatory requirements, the EIA process enables the integration of sustainability principles into project design and implementation. At SGE, we conduct EIAs in alignment with the EU EIA Directive (2011/92/EU, as amended by 2014/52/EU), ensuring early identification of potential risks and opportunities for environmental enhancement. Our approach combines predictive analysis with stakeholder collaboration to support effective, mitigation, and compensation strategies, contributing to sustainable land use biodiversity protection, and climate adaptation.

Our EIA consulting services include:

• Regulatory Scoping & EIA Compliance: SGE determines EIA requirements through screening and scoping aligned with EU and national regulations. We compile legally compliant documentation and support clients through authority reviews and public consultations

• Baseline Studies: We conduct site-specific evaluations of climate, air, water, soil, ecology, and socio-economic factors. Baseline data are enriched through geospatial tools to support robust environmental forecasting

• Impact Assessment & Predictive Analysis: We assess direct, cumulative, and long-term impacts using GIS, environmental modeling, and probabilistic simulations. Our methods support transboundary assessments and uncertainty-based scenario planning

• Mitigation Planning & Monitoring: We develop targeted mitigation hierarchies and practical environmental management plans, including monitoring protocols to ensure long-term project compliance and risk control

• Stakeholder Engagement: We guide public and stakeholder engagement processes to promote transparency and build trust, aligning with procedural requirements of the EIA Directive

By combining scientific rigor with strategic insight, SGE’s EIA services guide clients through the environmental permitting landscape and help ensure projects contribute positively to responsible development.

A successful project begins with a thorough understanding of the site’s environmental and geological conditions. SGE’s Environmental Site Assessments (ESA) provide critical data on soil quality, hydrogeological conditions, potential contamination, and geotechnical constraints, ensuring that any environmental hazards are identified and addressed early in the planning process. By aligning with EU standards and international environmental management guidelines such as ISO 14007 and ISO 14015, our investigations lay the foundation for informed decision-making, minimizing unforeseen challenges and ensuring full compliance with regulatory frameworks.

SGE conducts site-specific, phased assessments to evaluate the suitability of land for development, focusing on contamination risks, surface and groundwater management, and land-use history. These investigations are customized to the project scope and regulatory context, ensuring that both environmental and structural risks are assessed holistically.

Key services in site investigations include:

• Hydrogeological Studies: In-depth analysis of the site’s geological and hydrogeological framework, evaluating aquifer properties, groundwater flow, and pollutant transport, critical for compliance with the EU Groundwater Directive (2006/118/EC)

• Contaminated Land Assessments: We identify and evaluate environmental liabilities and contamination risks at sites with known or suspected pollution, particularly in brownfield redevelopment or land-use change contexts. Our approach combines historical site analysis, conceptual site model (CSM) development per ISO 21365, and targeted sampling strategies. In alignment with ÖNORM ISO 14015, we deliver Environmental Due Diligence assessments that support real estate transactions, mergers, and investment decisions by clarifying environmental risks, regulatory obligations, and potential remediation costs

• Subsurface Investigations: High-resolution subsurface mapping using non-invasive geophysical techniques (e.g., ground-penetrating radar, electrical resistivity tomography) to detect buried infrastructure, geological anomalies, or voids

• Environmental Drilling and Sampling: Targeted borehole and well installations using environmentally safe practices to gather reliable soil and groundwater samples for laboratory analysis

• Vulnerability and Resilience Assessments: Evaluation of site sensitivity to environmental and anthropogenic pressures such as flooding, landslides, or industrial legacies, which is essential for developing effective mitigation strategies and supporting climate-resilient planning

These investigations form the backbone of SGE’s geo-environmental consulting services, ensuring that environmental risks are fully understood, documented, and managed before development proceeds. Our goal is to help clients meet due diligence obligations, reduce liabilities, and promote environmentally responsible land use.

SGE applies advanced, non-invasive geophysical techniques to characterize subsurface conditions in support of environmental assessments, remediation planning, and risk management. Our focus on non-seismic methods allows for efficient, low-impact data acquisition in sensitive or developed areas. By combining geophysical methods with drilling data, soil sampling, hydrogeological analysis, and remote sensing, we produce high-resolution 2D and 3D models that enhance environmental and geotechnical evaluations. This integrated approach supports effective decision-making, minimizes intrusive work, and optimizes investigation budgets.

Key services in geophysical prospecting include:

• Electrical Resistivity Tomography (ERT-IP): Used to map resistivity and chargeability variations in the subsurface, these techniques provide detailed insights into lithology, moisture content, salinity, and contamination. Ideal for delineating landfill boundaries, locating contaminant plumes, and assessing clay-rich or water-saturated zones

• Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR): High-frequency radar imaging allows us to detect buried structures, voids, tanks, and shallow utilities. It is especially effective in urban environments where excavation is limited, and in historical or brownfield sites with undocumented infrastructure

• Electromagnetics (EM): EM methods rapidly identify conductivity contrasts to locate metallic debris, underground storage tanks, saline intrusions, or impacted soil zones. These surveys are useful for Phase I and II assessments, UXO detection, and preliminary screening of contamination

Geophysical investigations play a central role in environmentally responsible site development and rehabilitation. SGE’s non-invasive, high-resolution methods reduce the need for exploratory drilling, lower investigation costs, and ensure a clearer understanding of subsurface risks before project implementation.