Environmental Science Associates

A huge win for climate protection efforts in Southern California! This summer the EPA awarded a $500 million grant to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in Southern California’s freight transportation sector, funded through the agency’s $4.3 billion Climate Pollution Reduction Grants program. The $500 million grant benefits the South Coast Air Quality Management District’s INVEST CLEAN program, a transportation initiative between agencies, labor organizations, and communities within Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, and San Bernardino counties. The program will invest in and help scale zero-emissions technologies along the region’s notoriously congested shipping and freight corridors, and is expected to reduce 12 million metric tons of GHG emissions, and cut more than one billion gallons of diesel fuel by 2050! We’re thrilled to have played a role in securing this crucial grant for South Coast AQMD. To help qualify the region for this funding, ESA’s climate planning specialists worked with local agencies and other stakeholders to produce Priority Climate Action Plans in less than a year for the Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA) and the Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario MSA. These essential climate plans aggregated emissions data and developed key “implementation ready” GHG reduction measures for the program. ESA’s Climate Planning Services Director Jeff Caton and Air Quality, Climate, and Acoustics Director Brian Schuster share more about the program and ESA’s climate planning efforts in the following article. Read it at the following link: https://lnkd.in/g3rjTPNU #INVESTCLEAN #ZeroEmissions #FreightTransportation #ClimatePlanning #PriorityClimateActionPlan #GHGEmissionsReduction #Decarbonization #AirQuality #EPA #SouthernCalifornia

🥎⛹️♀️🏀Squad goals! It’s been an awesome season this year for employee-owners participating in our recreational sports leagues and games. ESA’s Narwhals (a.k.a. the “unicorns of the sea”) team wrapped up their 2024 season of the San Francisco Architects, Engineers, and Contractors league, finishing up with a 8-7-0 record this year, and celebrated their success with a pizza party. The Northwest region staged its 14th annual ESA kickball tournament for employee-owners and their families, scoring a tied game in the closely fought match between the Rainier Pounders and Blood, Sweat, and Beers teams. Until next summer, we’ll see you on the mound! 📷's by Michael Friedman and Julie Bayer #WorkHardPlayHard #ESACulture #Winning #GoTeamGo #SoftballLeague #Kickball #GoNarwhals

More great news out of our Southeast region! We’re thrilled to share that Christopher Warn has been promoted to Biological Resources Director. A principal environmental scientist, project manager, and employee-owner since 2016, Chris has more than 26 years of experience in coastal and watershed studies, management, and restoration. Throughout his career, he has worked across the nation on complex environmental projects, notably on the emergency response to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and he has supported many environmental programs—from Everglades restoration to port deepening and expansion programs. His passion for biology is only matched by his commitment to fostering a culture that is diverse, equitable, and inclusive. As Biological Resources Director, he will oversee the southeast region’s biological experts specializing in environmental planning, permitting, restoration, water quality, and land management. Please join us in congratulating Chris on his new position! #Congrats #BiologicalResources #EnvironmentalPlanning #Restoration

ESA ❤️ our Ownership Committee for all that they do to keep our collective focus on high performance, delivering value to our clients and partners, and building community across the firm.

Though the Summer Olympics wrapped up nearly two weeks ago, we can’t get enough sports! 🏀⛹🏽⚾ ESA sports fans came out to watch two MLB and WNBA events: the Oakland A’s play the San Francisco Giants in the Battle of the Bay at the Oakland Coliseum, and the Los Angeles Sparks play the Chicago Sky at Crypto.com Arena. It was a fun time spent together cheering on the athletes and rooting for our teams, with the extra bonus of seeing our name on the jumbotrons! What sporting event should we go to next? #GoTeam #InItToWinIt #FunWithCoworkers #ESACulture #OaklandAs #SanFranciscoGiants #LASparks #FunTimes

✈️ On National Aviation Day, we recognize the remarkable advancements in aviation and the innovators who transformed flight and aeronautics. In celebration, we asked ESA’s aviation team to share what made their passion for aviation take flight: Neal W: “During my two tours in Afghanistan, aviation was our lifeline, from parachuting us in on October 19, 2001, to helping us get up the Hindu Kush to evacuate the wounded. After that, I swore I would only work at a desk, ever again. Once separated out, I got a ‘teaser’ in consulting, working with my father, a man known far-and-wide as a terrific mentor in the aviation industry. Not only was he instrumental in getting me hooked on aviation, but was the role model I constantly strive to be.” Autumn Ward: “From a very young age, my dad instilled a love of aviation and aerospace. He would take me to Orlando International Airport to watch planes land and Kennedy Space Center to watch space shuttle launches. We also toured the Boeing factory in Everett, Washington (my son’s middle name is Everett…it’s not a coincidence!). In elementary school, he would visit my class and talk about the shuttle program, and I would always say I wanted to be him when I grew up. While my career pivoted to airports/aviation, which I love, I did start my career working for the shuttle program!” Jean Christophe Dagohoy Dick: “Both my parents were born on different continents and met here in a third one, here. Without aviation, I simply would not be here—I have a debt of existence to aviation. Every time we flew either to the Philippines or France to see the grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins, the flights there were always the most exciting part of the trip. Lining up on runways, waiting for the take-off thrust to push you into the seat as the rain droplets flew past on the windows of the plane, fleeing the wrath of lift. Every second of that was why I'm in aviation today.” Mike Arnold, LEED AP Arnold: “For me, it was Dr. Francis X. McKelvey’s airport planning class at Michigan State University. Two weeks in, I knew it was what I was going to do with the rest of my life.” 📷's Jean Christophe Dagohoy Dick poses in front of a Japan Airlines DC10 while on a trip to visit family in the Philippines, Neal W poses for a photo with his dad and aviation mentor, Autumn Ward visits the Air Lock on the Space Shuttle Discovery, and her dad as he works on the ISS Cupola, Mike Arnold, LEED AP and ESA Aviation Planner Joseph Halisky attend the recent Florida Airports Council meeting. #NationalAviationDay #Aviation #AviationConsulting #AviationCareers #Aeronautics #TakeFlight

🌱 Restoring habitat, all the while improving flood protection, sea level rise, and filtering wastewater! Along the shorelines of San Francisco Bay, where more than 85 percent of historic wetlands have been lost following decades of fill and development, engineers are developing new nature-based, multi-benefit projects known as horizontal levees. A broad, flat, vegetated transitional slope placed between tidal marshes and coastal levees, a horizontal levee is composed of grassy wet meadows, brackish marshes, and riparian scrub—replicating hillslopes which once met the historic marsh edge. This nature-inspired engineering design and infrastructure enhances wildlife habitat and provides flood protection, wastewater treatment, and sea level rise adaptation. ESA is leading the design and permitting for four horizontal levee projects in the San Francisco Bay Area, including two innovative pilot projects in Palo Alto and San Lorenzo. The Oro Loma Horizontal Levee project, the first horizontal levee project on the west coast and modeled as a living laboratory, is helping engineers study how horizontal levees provide resilience and water quality improvement to inform other levee projects across the Bay. The Palo Alto Horizontal Levee is the first project of its kind which will beneficially reuse treated wastewater for irrigation before discharging directly to the bay, all the while providing regional flood protection.  Read all about these projects at the following links: https://lnkd.in/gh4r6K2B and https://lnkd.in/g-UtP6WS #HorizontalLevee #NatureBasedSolution #CoastalEngineering #SeaLevelRiseAdaptation #FloodManagement #HabitatRestoration #Marsh #Wetland #SanFranciscoBay

🐐 The G.O.A.T. of fuel abatement and vegetation management, is none other than, well, goats! During the hot summer months, when grasses and vegetation become extremely dry, herds of these unfussy grazers are happy to consume combustible weeds, invasive plant species, shrubs, and foliage. With their hungry appetites—one herd can clear an acre in just a few days!— goats create crucial firebreaks and reduce fuel loads, helping to reduce the risk of wildfires in nearby communities, while also promoting the growth of native vegetation. In Millbrae, California, Eva Lin and fellow ESA biologists have been assisting goat fuel abatement and vegetation management activities to create a 30-foot-wide firebreak adjacent to a residential community, and are providing ongoing biological monitoring in the area which includes sensitive species habitat. Not a "baaa-d" day at the office, when you're working with these four-legged MVPs! 📷's by Eva L., Len Liu, Mandi McElroy and Darnell S. #Goats #VegetationManagement #FireManagement #FuelAbatement #Wildfire

Join us in raising a glass (or an ESA mug) to celebrate the anniversary of the Great American Outdoors Act! 🎉 Signed into law on August 4, 2020, this important legislation has led to the establishment of ongoing funding and investments to maintain our national parks and public lands. What better way to celebrate than to get outside and enjoy the beauty of our public lands, thanks to the GAOA! 🌳 📷 Photo from employee-owner Alena Norcott at Dewey Point in Yosemite National Park #GAOA #Conservation #OutdoorRecreation #NationalParks

Since the 1850s, approximately 67 percent of Oregon’s outer coast estuarine habitat has been lost to land development, contributing to drastic declines in salmon and steelhead populations. In the Siuslaw Basin, agriculture, grazing, and timber practices have degraded and reduced aquatic and riparian habitat. The McKenzie River Trust (MRT) purchased the Waite Ranch property to transform the land from a dairy farm to a vital tidal habitat along the Siuslaw River. In collaboration with the Confederated Tribes of the Coos, Lower Umpqua, and Siuslaw (CTCLUSI), Siuslaw Watershed Council (SWC), and MRT, ESA led the conceptual restoration design and preliminary engineering analyses, developed construction documents, prepared permit applications, and are providing engineering and environmental compliance services during construction. When construction is completed in 2025, the site will be a 200-acre, high-quality feeding and rearing habitat for Oregon Coast coho, Chinook salmon, steelhead, and sea-run coastal cutthroat trout, as well as other aquatic and avian species. Learn more about the project on our website: https://lnkd.in/gfwtTUxg