Experience
Our experience
Freshwater is a taonga, and it sits at the core of cultural identity for tangata whenua. High-quality fresh water is also fundamental to the protection and restoration of aquatic ecosystems already under pressure. We work on rivers, streams and wetlands with that dual lens, supporting community well-being as well as ecological and economic outcomes.
Capability areas
Our rivers, streams and wetlands work ranges from on-the-ground surveys through to engineering design and catchment-scale analysis.
Stream surveys and ecological baseline studies
Collaborative monitoring programme design
Engagement with iwi and community stakeholders
Wetland design and restoration support
Hydraulic and catchment modelling
Consent applications and expert evidence
Working alongside communities
A large part of our freshwater work is delivered alongside community groups, iwi and councils rather than as a one-sided consultancy exercise. Our people spend time in the field, talk through findings in plain language, and design monitoring programmes that participants can run with over the long term.
What this work involves
Freshwater work sits across three things that are usually treated separately: what lives in the water, how the water moves, and what people want to do with the land around it. Assessments that answer only one of those tend to fail at consent, because a hydraulically sound channel design that degrades habitat, or a restoration plan that floods the neighbour, will not survive scrutiny.
We combine ecological survey with hydraulic and catchment modelling so that the same team can describe existing condition, predict how a proposed change will behave in a flood, and design the works that follow. That includes stream and wetland baseline surveys, habitat and macroinvertebrate assessment, channel and floodplain modelling, and the design of wetland, riparian and watercourse rehabilitation works.
Stream, river and wetland ecological baseline surveys
Habitat, macroinvertebrate and water quality assessment
Hydraulic, hydrological and catchment-scale modelling
Wetland creation, restoration and riparian design
Watercourse rehabilitation and erosion control
Consent applications, assessments of effects and expert evidence
How we approach it
A monitoring programme is only worth designing if somebody can still run it in five years. Much of our freshwater work is delivered with community groups, iwi and councils rather than handed to them, so we design methods that a volunteer or a council officer can repeat consistently, write findings in language that does not need a translator, and spend time in the field with the people who will be doing the work after we leave. Where a project needs to go to a hearing we can carry it there, but the aim is usually to reach an outcome that does not require one.
