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Lambda Consult has been involved in groundwater exploration, exploitation, remediation and management since the early days at the beginning of the 1980s, when the environment at large became a serious issue on the political agendas. In many countries, a lot has been accomplished during these past three decades regards the clean-up of contaminated soil and groundwater, but on a worldwide scale it is just the proverbial drop in the ocean. When we look at the effects of mining, the metallurgical industries, chemical manufacturing, power generation, refining, use of pesticides and intensive agriculture, the problem takes on immense proportions and confronts us with severe problems.

Groundwater, although accounting for only about 0.9 % of the total volume of water on this earth, is still a major source of our need for drinking and irrigation water. However, the quality of the groundwater especially in the world's coastal areas, where the majority of the peoples is living, is deteriorating. This is not only because of the effects stated above, but even more seriously, because of intrusion of seawater into the coastal areas, as a result of over pumping of groundwater.

Salinization of agricultural lands is another very alarming problem in areas with surface waters for irrigation with relatively high content of total dissolved solids (TDS), with high evaporation rates and low rainfall numbers. Although this problem is not something of the recent past, but exists already for centuries, it is aggravated by the increasing world population, for which more food is needed, which can only be grown on high quality arable land. 

Leaching of acid solutions and heavy metals from mine tailings into the groundwater, as well as the use of cyanide and mercury for gold mining contribute significantly to a worsening quality of the groundwater and the environment at large. Many of the mining operations and old mine tailings are often in remote areas and the damage is therefore less obvious, but the damage is there nevertheless and it is spreading out.

It is never too late to change something for the better. Lambda Consult believes that many of the existing problems can be lessened if not solved by the electrokinetic techniques developed by us during the past decades.  Instead of spending billions of dollars and Euros on CO₂ reduction - its effect on our climate being questionable - a large part of these expenditures should be made available to tackle the problems outlined above.

Reinout Lageman, Director and Principal Consultant