Services and products to the governments

TUTKOVSKY has indispensable knowledge and expertise to help governmental bodies to organise a control system of the use of all kinds of natural resources, to diminish negative impact on a surrounding medium, to positively impact the public and to achieve greater economic stability.

TUTKOVSKY-made programmes of complex studying and use of natural resources help in creating an enabling environment and effective mechanisms for attracting systemic investments into the economy of the country. These programmes are based on a principle of harmonisation of interests of all partners of the projects on the use of natural resources, which includes rational nature management, optimum social and economic developing of regions and territories, level of health of the population and a condition of labour potential.

One of the main tasks, which are solved in the course of implementation of regional programmes, is the creation of modern geological maps that provide the main multi-purpose integrated geological basis for planning the development of natural resources, development of mineral resources, scientifically-substantiated planning of exploration, construction, land reclamation, protection of natural resources and the environment. With extensive experience of creating sets of these cards, TUTKOVSKY provides services to the governments of regional geological studies.

Currently, in many countries of the world, including the most developed, there is a large quantity of abandoned areas of extraction, many of which acted still before adoption of the modern regulatory norms pertaining to a surrounding medium. A significant part of territories with the depleted quarries, open pits, mines, dumps of mining and processing of raw materials, which often contain toxic substances, as well as oil and gas fields that were not re-cultivated or just partially re-cultivated, have a disrupted landscape and changed structure of the subsurface and are a source of environmental pollution. These «wounds of the earth» have a devastating impact on the environment and could seriously damage the reputation of both the extracting industry and of the governments. TUTKOVSKY provides services on the recovery and monitoring of the environment after the completion of projects on the exploration and production of energy and mineral resources.

Geologists who have a deep understanding of the geosphere, its composition, properties and dynamics, interplay with a hydrosphere, biosphere, a cryosphere, an aerosphere and anthroposphere can offer the optimised corrective policy for these territories of past extraction. To solve all complex tasks in the restoration of the natural environment, TUTKOVSKY invites professionals from all directions.

We live in a period of rising public expectations concerning the fact that exploration, development and utilization of natural resources are not risks to the environment, integrity and vitality of related ecosystems. An openness and constant dialogue, provision of necessary services to bodies of local self-government and public organisations that present the interests of territorial communities while taking into account the interests of the communities in the implementation of programmes and projects, which is a principle of activity of TUTKOVSKY.

The political parties, which represent the interests of large groups of the population, obtain from TUTKOVSKY the services on elaboration of the conceptual bases and programmes of a rational use of natural resources with the determination of the most effective first-priority steps, which can essentially improve the quality of life of the population, at least, of a certain region. The most painful ecological problems are identified that have risen as a result of uncontrolled or wasteful exploitation of energy and mineral resources, land, forest, water resources as well as the measures for their solution, the most vulnerable ecosystems that need conservation and restoration.

To implement the ecosystem approach to using natural resources, it is necessary to forge a new generation of management professionals in the state government and the extractive companies. Knowing the current state of natural resources of the country, variation of this state, resilience to the future natural and anthropogenic threats, the responsible persons and organisations should be capable to secure the safety of the nation, to maintain the vitality of economics, to protect the environment and to maintain the well-being of its citizens. Therefore, TUTKOVSKY provides services in the preparation and advanced training of such specialists, carries out scientific and methodical development of standardized means to assess the social impacts of projects on the use of natural resources.

 

Management of regional programmes of the integrated studying and rational use of the energy (oil, gas, solid combustible minerals), mineral (ore, non-ore and production wastes) and water (underground waters) resources

TUTKOVSKY analyses the current state of activity of the state (regional) governments in the sphere of the use of natural resources and gives suggestions for its organisation and improvement.

Organisation of system of the state (regional) management of the use of energy (oil, gas, solid combustible minerals), mineral (ore, non-ore and production wastes) and water (underground waters) resources

  • Definition of objectives, tasks and structure of the management bodies on the basis of the analysis of best international expertise;
  • Development and improvement of legislation in the sphere of nature management;
  • Organisation of national geological services and their regional bodies;
  • Organisation of bodies responsible for implementing state policy in the sphere of subsoil use;
  • Cooperation with international organisations to improve the efficiency of the management of natural resources.

Recommendations of TUTKOVSKY rest upon the analysis of strategies of leading world geological services (Association of the geological services of Europe, Canada, USA, etc.) and governmental bodies to implement the state policy in the sphere of the use of mineral resources in many countries.

Creating a national (regional) database of geological information

The basis for the development of regional programmes is the national (regional) data bank of geological information. ТUTKOVSKY provides services to national geological bodies in the creation of such data bank:

  • Revision, analysis and generalization of available geological and other materials, the retrospective transfer of information from paper to digital format;
  • Development and implementation of regulatory and methodical documents regulating the compilation of databases of geological information and digital geological maps;
  • Development and adaptation of specialized software;
  • Development of requirements to the contents and form of reporting of subsoil users of all forms of ownership;
  • Current replenishment of a data bank of geological information;
  • Compilation and maintenance of cadastre of deposits and manifestations of energy, mineral, water (underground water), cadastres of other natural resources;
  • Organisation of a system of open access to geological information.

Development and implementation of regional programmes of the integrated study and use of energy, minerals and water (underground waters) resources

At the stage of development of regional programmes, ТUTKOVSKY provides advisory services to governmental bodies:

  • Evaluating the mineral and raw material base and prospects of its development;
  • Assessment of the environmental and social impacts of the exploitation of the mineral resource base;
  • Planning of natural resource development, identifying the major tasks and directions of further study of the geological environment;
  • Attraction of grants of global and interstate organisations and funds for study of natural resources and preservation of the environment.

Regional programmes are implemented through the activities of the national geological services and activities of the specialized bodies for implementing the state policy in the sphere of subsoil use.

ТUKOVSKY provides national geological services and their regional bodies the managerial services in the form of:

  • Integrated regional geological studies for the establishment of national geological maps of new generation;
  • Geological and forecast works for different types of resources on the revealing and assessment of new promising areas for licensing (including forecasting of oil and gas bearing capacity, evaluation of areas of oil and gas bearing capacity);
  • Identification and study of objects of geological environment that need protection and preservation;
  • Systematization, harmonization of national geological data with pan-European and world-wide data;
  • Study of the ecological condition of near-surface geological features (soils and underground waters) to prevent the risks of shortage of food and potable water;
  • Study of natural and man-made hazards, development of measures to counter emergencies and disasters;
  • Development of measures to prevent climate changes through the reduction greenhouse gas emissions, geological storage of CO2, use of alternative energy sources, particularly geothermal ones;
  • Study of ecosystems and prediction of their changes;
  • Preservation of geological monuments and scientific knowledge;
  • Professional training and advanced training of national staff.

As for specialised organs on state policy implementation in the sphere of the use of subsoil, ТUKOVSKY provides them services on the definition of facilities of resource fund, being transferred to production companies, the forms and terms of the transfers:

  • Establishing criteria and development of an algorithm of differentiated assessment of license fees and payments for using natural resources;
  • Preparation of the information about the object and development of licensing terms (in particular, environmental and social);
  • Organisation of tenders for obtaining licenses for subsoil use;
    • Preparation of tender documentation;
    • Implementation of information and publicity measures for conducting the tenders;
    • Providing information on the licensed areas and blocks (creating an open information resource – «data room»);
    • Organisation and conducting of tenders;
    • Conclusion of agreements with the winners of tenders.

For many countries one or the other type of natural resources is crucial for the national economy. TUTKOVSKY designs and implements measures to avoid dependence on the monopoly of large consumer, to diversify deliveries of extractive products of national public and private companies to get the best price on the global market.

Regional programmes provide for:

  • Monitoring of the use of energy, mineral and water resources;
  • Monitoring the impact of resource exploitation on the environment;
  • Monitoring of observance by licensees of the licensing terms.

The regional programmes developed by TUTKOVSKY are aimed at the implementation of automated systems of monitoring natural resources. Work with these data systems is carried out by local personnel trained by TUTKOVSKY. We monitor and make necessary adjustments, perform necessary upgrades of software and provide advisory services.

 

Services related to the study and use of natural resources

TUTKOVSKY provides the services of regional geological investigations to the governments; for this purpose, first of all, it creates complete sets of the state (national) geological maps, as a multipurpose base of rational nature management, as well as the services to restore and monitor the environment after completion of the projects on the use of natural resources, regardless of when and by whom such projects are implemented.

Regional geological investigations

  • Creation of distance basis for geological maps by the interpretation of aerospace survey data;
  • Geo-morphological mapping and morph-structural analysis;
  • Preparation of geophysical and geochemical bases for geological mapping;
  • Geological survey and additional exploration of areas in the scale which is optimal for a given country (region);
  • Hydro-geological surveys;
  • Geological forecasting works for various kinds of energy and mineral resources (including forecasting of oil and gas bearing capacity, evaluation of areas of oil and gas bearing capacity), choice and assessment of promising areas for licensing;
  • Ecological and geological mapping;
  • Thematic and specialised investigations in specific directions;
  • Creating databases of geological information and digital geological maps;
  • Creation of composite geological maps of the countries (regions), development of legends to these maps.

Restoration and monitoring of the environmental conditions after completion of projects on the use of natural resources

The natural environment, after completing projects for the exploration and production of energy and mineral resources, undergoes change, which is expressed by the disturbance of the soil surface, the formation of new landforms, changes of hydrogeological conditions of territory, salination and pollution with hazardous substances and industrial waste, destruction of flora and fauna. Restoration of natural components is regarded as the main part of the neutralization of consequences of extractive activities.

Measures on the re-cultivation executable after completion of extraction operations contribute to only partial restoration of natural systems, and the further formation and development of ecosystems originating at the expense of self-recovery processes.

One of the problems of self-recovery of territory is the large duration of time that necessitates monitoring and management of scientifically proven self-healing processes aimed at the reduction of terms of regeneration of ecosystems in the areas of extractive activity.

It is also important to forecast the violations that are possible as a result of future environmental change. Restoration methods, such as permeable reactive barriers and encapsulations of contaminants can be unstable owing to the magnification of erosion, a drought, flooding or an underflooding that in turn can lead to the penetration of pollutants into the environment.

TUTKOVSKY elaborates the appropriate set of methods of restoration of ecosystems for each project of an ecological direction on the basis of geomodelling of territories taking into account the totality of all possible factors, which can affect the further state of the environment and the rate of regeneration of natural systems.

Ecological and geological assessment of the environmental condition of the territories after the completion of extracting energy and mineral resources:

  • Comprehensive large-scale ecological and geological mapping to determine the degree of violation of the natural system due to man-made impacts as well as the main indicators of technogenic changes;
  • Determination of the dynamics of hazardous geological processes and the development of strategy of actions for the localization and elimination of their negative impact on the environment;
  • Evaluation of the degradation of the natural environment;
  • Reconstruction of the natural systems prior to the beginning of the exploration and production of energy and mineral resources, determination of the possibility of their recovery;
  • Evaluation of the importance of ecological functions of the lithosphere and its components for the biological objects and society;
  • Definition of indisputable priority measures for the appropriate response to the consequences bearing the greatest risks to public health and life-supporting resources;
  • Acquaintance of persons who make decisions and inform the public about the efficiency of the project on the restoration of the natural environment and a positive impact on the society; stimulation of the public to the further participation in the decision-making process related to project implementation.

Development of design decisions on the basis of the creation of permanent models of natural-technogenic system with the determination of the most effective ecological technologies:

  • Creation of permanently functioning models of natural and technogenic system to develop the schemes and technological measures on environmental restoration;
  • Development of design solutions with the determination of the most effective environmental technologies and minimisation of material and monetary resources as well as recommendations on further use of the territory;
  • Determining a possibility of underground space using the CO2 burial to prevent climate change and for other purposes;
  • Drafting a space-time forecast of the development of the given system in case of the expected man-made and natural actions, prognostic assessment of the implications from these impacts on the environment.

Implementation of measures on re-cultivation of territories that have been adversely affected by the extraction of energy and mineral resources:

  • Mine reclamation:
    • Removal and storage of fertile soil layer and potentially fertile rocks;
    • Releasing surface from the large rock debris, industrial structures, building garbage and industrial waste with their subsequent disposal or organizing storage or processing;
    • Forming of spoil dumps of mines, quarries and also hydraulic mine dumps;
    • Surface levelling, shaping, terracing and slope consolidation of dumps, stabilization of quarries side walls, backfill of mining hole, consolidation of their side walls;
    • Assessment of the ecological safety of materials, substances, technologies, equipment used in the course of re-cultivation;
    • Chemical melioration of toxic soils;
    • Technical melioration of soils by increasing or decreasing their filtration properties;
    • Engineering accomplishment of the re-cultivated territory and anti-erosion measures (construction of drain, water-collecting and irrigation networks, roads, liquidation or use of dams, dikes, embankments, etc.);
    • Restoration of hydro-geological conditions, which were changed in the process of exploitation of deposits;
    • Coating of the levelled surface by a layer of a fertile soil or potentially fertile rocks, subsequent ploughing or loosening of territory.
  • Biological re-cultivation and restoration of the landscape systems based on the phyto and forest reclamation activities and restoration of biocenoses:
    • Package of agrotechnical and phytoreclamation activities aimed at the improvement of agrophysical, agrochemical, biochemical and other soil properties;
    • Agro-technical measures: selection of grass mixtures, species of forest cultures (or shrubs), norms of seeding or planting, taking into account soil and climatic conditions of the territory;
    • Determining the norm and periodicity of applying the fertilizers;
    • Determining a duration of the reclamation period;
    • Determining specific composition and optimum number of populations in biocenoses, measures on dissemination and creation of conditions for self-regulation of species.
  • Cleaning territories polluted by recovery of oil and other hydrocarbon:
    • Use of mechanical cleaning methods and gathering of oil from a soil surface using the mechanical means;
    • Use of physical and chemical cleaning methods using reactant neutralization, extraction by steam, recovery of territories with the help of initiated humic sorbent, use of activated peat, organic-mineral hydrophobic oil sorbent, sorbents on the base of fatty acids;
    • Use of biological cleaning methods by the application of special biological products, microorganisms: bacteria, fungi;
    • Use of integrated methods consisting in the combination of mechanical, biological and physico-chemical methods of cleaning the contaminated areas.
  • Use of phytoremediation to eliminate pollution by oil and oil products, heavy metals and other toxic substances – ««green cleaning»»:
    • Development of the optimal scheme of phytoremediation depending on the type and nature of contamination (selection of specific composition of plants which are optimal for eliminating this type of pollution in these soil and climatic conditions; the determination of the scheme of planting, the choice of the appropriate farming practices, including optimisation of a nutrition, and chemical protection of plants);
    • Cultivation of plants (conducting a package of agrotechnical measures, including the preparation of a seed material, soil preparation, inclusion of mineral fertilizers, use of protective equipment).

Monitoring of the state of restored natural environment:

  • Lay-out of an observation network of monitoring;
  • Observation of the environmental state;
    • Composition, state, properties and alterations of the natural and anthropogenic soils, rocks;
    • Concentration and spread of hydrocarbon compounds and other contaminants, tracking the paths of oil biodegradation on the phytoremediation areas;
    • Dynamics and geochemistry of underground waters;
    • State of the atmospheric air;
    • Exogenous and endogenous geological processes (karst, suffusion, landslides, avalanches, earthquakes, etc.);
    • Dynamics of relief changes;
    • Geotechnical processes;
    • Processes of interaction between engineering structures and the geological environment (shrinkage of the soils, condition and integrity of foundations, leakages of technogenic waters);
    • State and rates of self-recovery and developing of ecosystems;
  • Analysis of ecological and geological environments and forecasting of their changes;
  • Providing operational management of the status of the environment on the basis of geomodelling;
  • Development of forecasts and warnings about the changes of the environment;
  • Development of corrective actions and ways to prevent risks;
  • Development of scientifically well-founded recommendations on managing environmental situations.

 

Managing the projects and regional programmes of the integrated study and rational use of land and (surface) water resources, as well as alternative energy sources

In managing such projects and regional programmes, TUTKOVSKY’s objective is the achieving of results required by a customer, with the obligatory taking into account of the conditions of the rational use of certain resources, including socio-economic and ecological expediency. Thorough study of a condition of resources, degrees of pollution, opportunity of their restoration allows TUTKOVSKY to determine the most effective complex of methods and technological solutions to predict a further developing of natural and technogenic systems.

TUTKOVSKY, in the development of projects for the rational use of land and water resources, takes into account conformity to current legislative, normative and regulatory base of the country (region) in the field of environmental protection.

TUTKOVSKY conducts a monitoring of land resources and land use at national and regional level for carrying out of the comparative studies and analysis, which serve as the basis for service provided to the governments and other involved parties in developing and implementing a system of rational land use and a policy of managing land resources.

Depending on the conditions of the region, the nature and extent of pollution and depletion of land resources, TUTKOVSKY develops and implements projects for their restoration using mechanical, physical, chemical and biological methods of cleaning soils from man-made pollution and, if necessary, the combining of these methods. At the same time, climatic factors, topography, nature and characteristics of the soil cover, vegetation, geological, hydrogeological and hydrological conditions of the territory, economic and social factors of the development of land resources of the area are taken into account.

Projects related to the rational use of the land resources, which the TUTKOVSKY companies develop and implement in the interests of our customers, are based on the landscape-ecological principles providing an optimum relation of various directions of restoration of the disturbed areas, creating highly productive cenoses, increasing the fertility of the reclaimed soils and the avoidance of negative impacts of man-made structures on the environment, namely:

  • Elaboration of the control system for the protection and use of land resources with a view to their preservation and restoration of productivity;
  • Determining the environmental sustainability of agro-ecosystems to negative external factors;
  • Ensuring increased biological productivity of land resources;
  • Developing the package of measures on the struggle against the degradation of lands, development of erosive processes, tuning up of the system that is monitoring the processes of the degradation of soils;
  • Optimising a structure of a rational use of land resources.

TUTKOVSKY develops and implements scientifically well-founded projects on the restoration of natural ecological balance in water ecosystems and the rational use of their resources, namely:

  • Management of projects of the integrated use of water resource for ensuring drinking and process water supply, hydrotechnical amelioration and energy needs;
  • Development and management of the system of monitoring the concentration of pollutants in surface waters in places of their intensive economic-drinking use and in recreational areas; development and implementation of measures for purification of surface water;
  • Introduction of the control system over radioactive contamination of rivers, reservoirs, canals, irrigation networks in the zones of nuclear power plants.

TUTKOVSKY manages the projects and programmes (totality of projects), increasing energy supply security of the countries and territories through the use of non-conventional energy resources – sources of reliable, clean and efficient energy: solar, geothermal, wind, etc. These projects include:

  • Analysis and substantiation of possibilities of using the technologies of alternative energy supply, proceeding from the characteristics of the areas and climatic conditions;
  • Study of demand for energy carriers, circle of consumers and consumption levels;
  • Preparation of recommendations on the introduction of advanced technologies of growing and processing energy crops;
  • Study of capabilities and developing of energy transfer networks;
  • Conducting the energy and environmental audits of the operating units;
  • Training of specialists for servicing the complexes of alternative power supply.