blueskies environmental associates, inc. is a small 100% woman-owned environmental consulting firm based in Richmond, Virginia. Established in the summer of 2002, blueskies has grown to a staff with over thirty years experience in the environmental consulting arena, and stands ready to provide effective solutions and exceptional service to clients in both the private and public sector. From its inception, blueskies was formed with the main objective of providing high quality and specialized environmental services for its clients. We welcomed our Newport News office in 2008. Our staff has significant expertise in the following services: 1) regulatory compliance at federal, state and local levels for development that may need to consider wetland, stream buffer, water quality, stormwater, endangered species and cultural resources; 2) wetland and stream assessment, delineation and mitigation; 3) natural resource planning; 4) environmental impact analysis; and, 5) environmental site assessment. Our staff routinely handles a range of development projects, providing due diligence, natural resource planning and permitting assistance for single-family residences, subdivisions, commercial development, industrial and DOD facilities and airports. blueskies has regulatory experience with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps), the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the US Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and state and local governments of several states. We are active in trade associations and pride ourselves on tracking regulations and introducing new solutions to environmental challenges.
blueskies has full assessment and design capability for wetland and stream mitigation projects, and is currently working on two proposed mitigation banks, with others under consideration. The staff at blueskies has assessed thousands of acres and miles of stream channel for potential mitigation sites, and designed over 120 acres and over 3 miles of wetland and stream mitigation, respectively. Our staff has field experience in conducting wetland delineations and confirmations, stream impact assessments using the Virginia Unified Stream Methodology (USM), perennial stream determinations, functional assessments and wildlife assessments and management plans. In the field, blueskies personnel utilize sub-meter Global Positioning System (GPS) equipment as needed for accurate resource mapping, and perform GIS mapping and database management with ESRI ArcGIS software.
blueskies has guided numerous public clients through the process of complying with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) in a timely manner to facilitate capital improvement programs, completing site studies, agency coordination and NEPA documentation [e.g., categorical exclusion (CE) checklists, environmental assessments (EAs), environmental impact reports (EIRs), environmental impact statements (EISs), records of decision (RODs)]. Many of these same clients are aviation-related, for which blueskies professionals also have experience with such issues as deicing planning and collection, hazard management and bird strike assessment.
blueskies is a certified Virginia SWaM (B946), Pennsylvania DBE (12445), and Virginia WBE (031800).