When it comes to new building developments, there are certain gas protection measures that need to be put in place. This was the case for our client Gary and his new conservatory. At some point during the process, these protections measures were overlooked. For his new conservatory, a verified gas membrane was needed to be fitted to protect against the potential risk of ground gas ingress.
Unbeknownst to Gary he was left with an improperly completed project in terms of ground gas protection. It was only when the council visited that Gary realised the conservatory had been improperly built. Gary’s house was located in a former mining area and the council required a membrane to be fitted due to the potential risk from mines gas. As this had not been fitted, the council required the conservatory to be demolished and re-built with a membrane.
The council did suggest an alternative. Instead of demolishing the conservatory and starting again Gary could opt to carry out a full site investigation with gas monitoring program to demonstrate that a gas membrane wasn’t needed. Both options are costly for an individual homeowner.
Deciding not to go through the process of tearing down his conservatory just to rebuild it, or to go to the expense of a full site investigation, Gary reached out to GGS over the phone and managed to get in touch with our managing director.
Upon learning about Gary’s story, the GGS team decided to offer to come in and carry out internal surveys and reporting for free, to ensure that Gary could get a signed validation from the council for his conservatory. For GGS, we felt that it wasn’t really Gary’s fault, and it was largely unfair, which is what sparked the idea to offer pro-bono work for Gary and his family.
Now we’ve carried out the report, Gary can finally make the conservatory his new living room as it gets the best light and will be a nice space for his family. We chatted to Gary about how he feels about the work that GGS carried out and he told us:
‘I would like to thank you and all your team who have helped me. I’ve talked to 2 people in my lifetime who could have charged me thousands of pounds but for their own personal reasons, chose not to. You’re the second one. So, when you’re having a rubbish day, and nothing is going right this text will come into your head and put a wee smile on your face. So, no more words just a wee smile that says it all.’
Often ground gas protection for built environments are put in place as a ‘just in case’ but using innovative approaches such as continuous monitoring can provide accurate information on the true risks, saving money and providing more sustainable solutions. In this instance we felt that Gary had been left with a stressful situation that should have been an enjoyable expansion. When he reached out to us at GGS, we decided to do the work for free simply because we wanted to help.
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The following pages include news articles, videos, guidance notes and white papers on a range of ground gas related topics which we hope you will find of interest. Please browse through but if you can’t find something on your particular issue of interest, we’d be very pleased to hear from you so we can put that right.
GGS is proud to share that it has become a founding member of the Environmental Industries Association. The Environmental Industries Association (EIA) has been set up to raise awareness on environmental issues. Keep on reading here.
