Ecological consultants are in charge of undertaking a variety of activities in connection with the evaluation of the ecological importance of a place. Typically, these evaluations pertain to submitted project endeavors such as housing, commercial and mining constructions. They could also be to produce info on the ecological importance of sites to a range of stakeholders. Evaluations are essential due to the fact that there are a range of legal requirements developed under state and federal government environmental laws that need to be considered when a task will result in an influence on the natural environment.

Main industry sectors that utilise ecological consultancy services.
Ecological consultants work with a variety of organisations:
Federal and State authorities divisions such as environmental protection agencies, conservation agencies (e.g. NSW Office of Strategic Lands), land management agencies (e.g. NSW Office of Strategic Lands) and catchment management authorities.
District councils performing analyses of property in parks and reserves; critique of development applications; application or property zoning.
Major real estate developers of housing, industrial or mining ventures.
Law practices that take care of environmental and planning issues.
Neighborhood groups who need qualified guidance on environmental qualities and management e.g. environmental action organizations, bushcare groups.

Ecological consultants may design, apply and record the efficacy of ecological management strategies; provide professional environmental recommendations in court cases, to independent commissions of investigation, parliamentary groups, urban planning groups and at district council meetings.
Ecological professionals are counted on to produce expert advice and effective solutions to customers and government authorities. An ecological professional ought to have appropriate tertiary credentials, an understanding of environmental planning and assessment processes and the parties involved, research abilities and report-writing abilities, solid customer liaison abilities and the ability to perform efficiently as part of a project unit, the capability to meet tight deadlines while still keeping a high standard of work.

Field ecologists should likewise have demonstrated experience in vegetation and/or fauna and habitat survey and recording techniques, including the capacity to distinguish plant and/or animal species and their habitats.

Predicting prospective ecological impacts of development or activity proposals, and recommending the best ways to lower or avoid them, are specialist skills that are generally gained early in ecological consultancy. Therefore, an excellent comprehension of endangering processes and the ecological needs of species and communities is highly beneficial for an ecological professional.

An environmental consultant will be associated with a variety of tasks such as field analyses, usage of geographic information systems (GISs), consultation with customers and stakeholders, interpretation of environmental legal files and planning of reports and management plans just to name a few.

There are a range of standard documents written by ecological consultants including things like vegetation and animals reports, environmental impact assessments, opportunity and constraint reports, species impact statements, vegetation maps, vegetation management plans, endangered species management plans, fire management plans and peer review of development applications.

The usual minimum prerequisite is a degree (or equivalent) in a biological science from a recognized (government-accredited) tertiary institution. The majority of ecological consultants have at least a B. Sc. (Hons) degree, some with higher degrees (M. Sc. or Ph.D).
A handful of professionals that have a relevant diploma in applied science from a TAFE Education (e.g. Dip. Biol. Technology. or Dip. Appl. Sc.), and who have worked for several years as a scientific officer or field assistant in a biological discipline, have also succeeded as ecological consultants.
Degree certifications that are bought on the internet from “non-accredited universities” or diploma mills are not identified by state and federal government authorities and the environmental consultancy industry in Australia.

An interesting initiative for a growing waste problem that also helps tackle climate change and biodiversity, what more could you ask for! A company in California named Reduce. Reuse. Grow. has come up with a biodegradable coffee cup, embedded with native tree and plant seeds. When you’ve finished your coffee, you can plant the cup, or return them, to be planted by the company.

Americans discard over 146 billion coffee cups annually, even with recycling, the paper itself can only be reused 2-3 times before the fibers are unusable and need to be discarded in local landfill sites.

Each of these new cups will be capable of extracting over 1 ton of CO2 out of the atmosphere annually, once planted. Currently the company is using the damaged fibers from local recycling centers, which would normally be too rough to implement back into a packaging product. They are using these fibers to make the most eco-friendly coffee cup available.

The consumer visits a participating coffee shop, has a cup of coffee, and then they can take the cup and plant it in a number of different environments, depending on which variety of seeds they have in their cup.

There are instructions on the bottom of the cup, it’s pretty straight forward. You unravel the cup, soak it in water for five minutes and then plant it and watch it grow.
So the morning cup of coffee can now help us wake up in more ways than one!

You might say that highly successful businessmen have privileged information, but it’s not really the truth, it’s much less mysterious, it just isn’t really that discernible to the majority of men and women. But if you dig around a bit and open your eyes it will pretty soon become very clear to you. Are you curious yet? Ok, I won’t keep you in suspense, what follows is the key, almost all men and women who are super prosperous in nearly any field you care to mention have used a mentor.

So exactly what is a mentor? A mentor is someone else who has actually been there and done that! They have years of experience in exactly what it takes to make it in a certain field. In business, mentors can direct you through difficult times and help bolster your prospects of success, by helping you act wisely when you take on new obstacles. The very best mentors have really lived and dealt with the same headaches which you are facing and have had plenty of experience in their recognized industry.
If you look beyond the title of coach, you will see that the majority of effective coaches are ex-champions, or at the very least ex-players. So they are more than coaches, they do more than teach strategy, they transfer experience. The idea of a mentor is that you get to learn from their missteps and by doing this, avoid making the same false steps they did on their way up. This can really help to speed up your success.
Business Mentors are important to many companies and even first-class CEO utilizes them, because they have typically encountered the predicaments that you confront, and so they can help you stay clear of some of the traps that lie on the road to success.

While Business Mentors are important to every organization, so are Business Coaches. Exactly what is the difference, you ask? Instead of mentors, Business Coaches will help you grow management and business abilities needed for success. They teach methods where a business mentor is more a veteran confidant.
Lots of individuals try and fail in business, and in any commercial enterprise, it is only a minority that get to ascend to the top, and those that employ mentors and business coaches have a far better chance of success.

Who Will Mentoring Programs Help?
Any individual seeking success in any field can gain from a mentor, in truth, a lot of people in business including leading CEO’s that are seeking to fast track growth, new and upcoming leaders that are searching for help finding out the ropes, and business owners who are seeking to move their business in the ideal direction. Why hinder your success by getting stuck in the pitfalls of your market. A really good mentor will see things that you can not see, due to the fact that they have experienced the path you are on and this can help you get to your end goal faster.

Contaminated land consultants manage compliance and audit matters where audits are called for if a real estate is being rezoned to a much more “sensitive” land use, as an example, from business to residential, or if an application has been made to take off land from the Contaminated Sites Register and their services are quite often utilized by residential property developers when purchasing (or selling) land appropriate for business or residential development.

The initial service a contaminated land conusltancy will provide is to determine the likelihood of site contamination which is described as a Preliminary Site Investigation (PSI), or a Phase 1 Environmental Site Assessment report. The PSI ought to be sufficient to identify potential types/sources of contamination, locations of prospective contamination, human and ecological receptors and possibly affected media (dirt, groundwater, etc).

A complete Preliminary Site Investigation (PSI) will certainly include the following:
identification and description of the site,
the site record (zoning, occupants, historic usages, aerial images, ownership, activities, consultations, etc);
the environmental setting (geology, hydrogeology, topography, etc);
a site reconnaissance visit to visually inspect the site (and surrounds) for contamination;
an initial theoretical site model; and
(optionally) minimal contaminant sampling and evaluation at areas of potential environmental issue.

A PSI might conclude that there is a significant potential for contamination (in which case further studies need to be conducted). Nevertheless, if an extensive preliminary investigation reveals a history of non-contaminating activities and there is no other proof or suggestion of contamination, more examination is not needed.

Nevertheless, if a Preliminary Site Investigation (PSI) identifies a likelihood of contamination and the available information is insufficient to enable site management strategies to be created, a Detailed Site Investigation, or DSI, may have to be carried out.
The DSI is the site testing, or Phase 2 investigation stage. It sets out to mark the vertical and lateral degree of site contamination – usually with the site’s proposed land usage in mind; or to inform upon appropriate site remediation or management methods.

Soil is always examined and groundwater and/or surface water is tested where the past usage of the site signifies there is a possibility of contamination; the soil is contaminated with substances that can contaminate groundwater; or, if a surrounding site is known to be, or is possibly contaminated, and there is a threat of the contamination migrating to your site.

Where an appropriately planned and executed DSI demonstrates that the site is not contaminated, then no additional jobs are called for. If it demonstrates that the site is contaminated, further investigation to inform decontamination requirements or to make clear possible human health risks may be required.

Environmental auditing of a site can be a protracted exercise consisting of soil and groundwater evaluation, human health risk assessment, determination of “clean up to the extent feasible” of contaminated groundwater, and off-site testing.
A contaminated land audit might recognize environmental contamination issues that require rectification or management.

As mentioned, full and total clean up of contaminated land is not always needed. A contaminated land audit might be completed on a site which contains some ‘residual contamination’, and the auditor has issued a ‘Statement of Environmental Audit’.
Development on this land can then proceed, as long as the contamination is in keeping with acceptable land usage.

The Statement of Environmental Audit may have particular conditions, particularly if the site has been found to be a source site of contamination. Sites having a finalized Statement of Environmental Audit may necessitate:
Ongoing Groundwater Quality Management Plan of action;
Soil Contamination Management Strategy; or
Further soil/health-risk assessment requirements if disturbed

If you are a property owner or land developer, one of the most important thing to understand concerning contaminated land is that land owners can be held responsible for the remediation of contamination on their land.
Consequently, it’s important to look into a property’s contamination status before purchase, to avoid buying pricey environmental liabilities along with the land.

“The Matrix is everywhere. It is all around us. Even now, in this very room. You can see it when you look out your window or when you turn on your television. You can feel it when you go to work… when you go to church… when you pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth.
Neo: What truth?
Morpheus: That you are a slave, Neo. Like everyone else you were born into bondage. Into a prison that you cannot taste or see or touch. A prison for your mind.”
Morpheus: Have you ever had a dream, Neo, that you were so sure was real? What if you were unable to wake from that dream? How would you know the difference between the dream world and the real world?

Morpheus: You’ve been living in a dream world, Neo.

Neo: This… this isn’t real?
Morpheus: What is real? How do you define real? If you’re talking about what you can feel, what you can smell, what you can taste and see, then ‘real’ is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain.

“Is there any way to be sure that your whole life has not been a dream? I don’t think that there is. Typically we call some experiences “dreams” and others “reality” by contrasting them. Experiences that we call “real” are consistent and predictable. For example,
people don’t just get up and fly away in “real life” while they sometimes do in dreams. And it is not unusual for the experiences we have in dreams to jump around from one time and place to another, while those events we call “real” do not. But if your whole life has been a dream, then there is nothing to contrast these experiences with. In this case, the “dreams” that you recall each night are just dreams within the dream. And that contrast still holds. Even if your whole life has been a dream you could distinguish your nightly dreams from your “waking experiences” much of the time. But how do you know that you are not in Neo’s predicament- that even your waking experiences are simply more dreams- just more predictable ones? Morpheus’s suggestion seems correct. If you have never awakened from the dream to see what “real life” is actually like, you would have absolutely no way to discern that you are dreaming.”
― Matt Lawrence, Like a Splinter in Your Mind: The Philosophy Behind the Matrix Trilogy

You have a problem with authority, Mr. Anderson. You believe that you’re special, that somehow the rules don’t apply to you. 
Trinity: Because you have been down there, Neo. You know that road. You know exactly where it ends. And I know that’s not where you want to be.

 
“This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back. You take the blue pill – the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe.

You take the red pill – you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes. Remember, all I’m offering is the truth – nothing more.”

Know Thyself

“I’m trying to free your mind, Neo. But I can only show you the door. You’re the one that has to walk through it”

“You have to let it all go, Neo. Fear, doubt, and disbelief. Free your mind.”

“There’s a difference between knowing the path and walking the path.”

The matrix explores the themes of awareness, reality and beliefs. Or more simply your perception of “reality” to be because of the beliefs you have about reality. “The mind makes it real”

The main character is first introduced as Mr Thomas Anderson. We soon find out that he has another name, Neo. Neo is the french word for new and it is an apt name for the character as we follow his journey from one of being limited in his awareness so that he can only see that which he has been conditioned to see and that he therefore believes in, to suspending his usual perception of life so he can see what the matrix is and how it has a complete hold on everyone in it. He goes through a process of challenging his beliefs about reality, about himself, about what is possible and as a result becomes new, unrestrained by the beliefs that held him in place before. When he turns to face the agent in the subway, “he is beginning to believe” there is a moment in the ensuing fight where it appears the agent (the strongest and most aggressively limiting aspects of the matrix) has the upper hand, holding his head to face the oncoming train and call
s him Mr Anderson, his name from the matrix. Neo rejects this and asserts with conviction “My name is Neo”. Thus declaring how he now saw himself and would not accept the past name to define his identity and associated limitations. It is no coincidence that this was a pivotal moment where Neo then threw off the agent and had his first victory against him.

 
Boy: Do not try and bend the spoon – that’s impossible.
Instead, only try to realize the truth.
Neo: What truth?

Boy: There is no spoon.
Then you will see it is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself.”

Morpheus: What are you waiting for? You’re faster than this. Don’t think you are. Know you are.

Morpheus: How did I beat you?
Neo: You… you’re too fast.
Morpheus: Do you believe that my being stronger, or faster, has anything to do with my muscles in this place? You think that’s air you are breathing now?