Fragments of orange coral with white tentacles on small cement anchors in a tank.

Mesophotic coral can live at depths of 500 feet below the ocean surface. Even at this depth, some of the mesophotic corals in the Gulf of Mexico were affected by the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010. Our coral scientists supporting NOAA’s National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science are studying the extent of this impact.

Three of our employee owners participated in a mission to extract the corals from the Gulf of America (formerly Gulf of Mexico) that were then transported to laboratories in Galveston, Texas, Gainesville, Florida, and Charleston, South Carolina. Once the Charleston specimens were housed in custom-made tanks, our scientists began studying and caring for the corals. They feed the colony multiple times daily, and study their growth and reproduction. In an effort to restore the damaged coral colonies in the Gulf of Mexico, the team is studying how to maximize growth and outplanting at a larger scale.

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Installing Environmental Monitoring Stations

Our field crews installed/updated two environmental monitoring stations in remote locations in the Pacific Northwest. Multiple types of sensors were installed including air and soil temperature, precipitation, soil moisture and soil redox potential. These stations provide data for designing and evaluating soil remediation projects for U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of Research and Development. Installing…

Responding to HazMat Spills

CSS supports several Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) campuses throughout the U.S. On-site CSS personnel are trained in hazardous material spill response and clean-up and provide this support within buildings and throughout campuses. As part of our contract with the CDC Hazardous Waste Program, CSS hazmat-trained employee owners are responsible for safely collecting,…

Expanding a Popular Flood Exposure Tool

We recently assisted our client, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Office for Coastal Management, with updating one of their most popular tools, the Coastal Flood Exposure Mapper.