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5 tools to get more EHS tasks done with less staff

EHS software can be a boon or a bane of your life at work. Here are the 5 time- saving tools Locus’s EIM provides that can be the difference between the former versus the latter.

1. Mobile

Do you enter field data onto a paper form, and then have to manually type it into a spreadsheet or database when you get back to the office? Or have you ever been in the field and entered data into your remote mobile device and have lost the data due to the lack of internet signal? Locus’ Mobile application allows you to sync with your server to create data collection profiles on a mobile device, whether it’s your phone or a tablet. This application will allow you to click through and enter data on the device and store the data, even when you are offline. As a result, data only need to be entered once on your device, and then they are seamlessly loaded into your cloud-hosted solution.

Using Mobile you have data entry directly on the mobile device, with immediate data availability on the cloud when you reach an internet signal. Other advantages include location metadata and mapping integration, bar-code/or code scanning, voice recognition and form customization. If you would like to know more, check out the Top 10 cool features in Locus Mobile.

2. EDD Loader

With EIM’s electronic data deliverables (EDD) loader, you can upload and validate several thousand records within a minute. Laboratories are not required to use the same reporting format, yet the results will still end up at the same place in the database where sample data came from. Locus EIM also has a special lab interface so that your labs (with your permission) can upload their own EDDs. You no longer need to spend time receiving and processing EDD files from your lab. The labs simply log in directly, upload your reports, and they are immediately available to you.

EIM provides you access to popular features such as a planning module, forms for entering field data, a utility to upload EDDs, built-in mapping tools, and an extensive reporting and plotting module. It also has a calendar module for viewing information on sampling events and uploaded EDDs, automated exceedance notifications, and sophisticated statistical evaluation tools designed specifically for environmental data.

3. Sample planning

Setting up and implementing a complex sampling plan can be a time-consuming effort. Depending on the purpose and extent of the sampling plan, you may have dozens of analyses to complete at varying frequencies and locations. You may also have multiple compliance programs with overlapping requirements. EIM’s sample planning can save you valuable time and effort by assembling your requirements into a concise calendar, preprinting all of your chain of custody records and bottle labels, and tracking the collection of samples from the field to the lab. As an added bonus, the automation of this process ensures you’ll never miss another required sample.

4. Discharge Monitoring Reports

Locus’ EIM DMR tool solves the problem of time-consuming, labor-intensive, and expensive manual report generation by automating the data assembly, calculations, and formatting of Discharge Monitoring Reports. Depending on the type of discharge and the regulatory jurisdiction, you may be required to report information such as analytical chemistry of pollutants, flow velocity, total maximum daily load, and other parameters. For companies that report from 100 to 1,000 facilities, producing a DMR also becomes a major expense.

Thanks to Locus’ DMR reporting tool, companies can generate DMRs within minutes with validated data in approved formats, with all of the calculations completed according to regulatory requirements. Companies can set up EIM for its permitted facilities and realize immediate cost and time savings during each reporting period.

5. Formatted Data Tables

For most environmental database systems, getting the right data out is just the first step in assembling your reports. Comprehensive systems rarely store data in a format that is ready to submit to a regulatory agency or other party. Typically, you have a labor-intensive process of restructuring, labelling, footnoting, formatting, and paginating the data into tables that can be readily interpreted. EIM’s formatted reporting tools allow you to set up any number of table formats with specific grouping, sorting, footnotes, headers, and other data processing steps. Then you just select your data range, pick your format, and the table is ready to download or print directly from your web browser. And if you make a mistake, the report can be instantly regenerated without any effort.

Getting the most out of EHS mobile apps

Mobile tools for EHS have been around for some time now. By now, most users are familiar with the benefits such as instant data collection and access to reference information for better, more reliable EHS programs. However, as any tech-savvy individual knows, new software tools are consistently becoming more powerful and more accessible, and that is certainly true for mobile applications. That “ground-breaking” EHS mobile app that you purchased five years ago may now be looking a little dated if your software provider has not actively updated it. Here are some of the beyond-the-basic features that you probably really want, but perhaps never knew existed for your EHS mobile app.

Location metadata and mapping integration

Your coordinates are actively being recorded every time your phone moves. Why not record that data as part of an incident report or sample collection? Or use that information to locate the position of a monitoring well or other asset? Much of EHS information is associated to a specific location, so automatically storing your location can help ensure that you know where your data are originating.

You may be thinking that phone/tablet GPS is not very accurate, and you would be correct…..for now. According to GPS.gov, phone accuracy is typically accurate to within a 4.9 m (16 ft.) radius under open sky. While this may be accurate enough for some situations, it will not be sufficient for others. However, according to the IEEE, a respected technical engineering association, 2018 and beyond will bring new more accurate chips to phones that will improve GPS accuracy to about 30 centimeters, which should be much more useful for field locations especially when identifying the scene of a spill or accident.

So start thinking about what can be improved with your business process by getting more accurate location information, and start looking at upgrading mobile devices in the next year or two.

Barcode and QR code scanning

You are probably already using your phone to compare prices at your local store. It is amazingly easy to simply scan a product’s barcode and instantly see the best available price locally or online. Since virtually every phone/tablet now has a built-in camera, you can use that to scan barcodes or QR codes to associate data entry with a tagged location or asset. This can save you from possible mismatch errors that can occur when simply selecting from a list or typing in data.

For users with thousands of locations/assets, it’s also a huge time saver when you can skip the long list of locations and just point and click. Moreover, for anyone tracking assets or even chemical inventory, barcodes are essential. In fact, many facilities have been using barcodes for years, but now they don’t need a specialized device. Barcodes or QR codes can be incorporated into mobile apps in new and unexpected ways to streamline business process and do more in the field with less physical overhead.

Therefore, the next time you are doing an audit, you can easily examine an instrument and immediately determine its calibration and maintenance status along with reporting any audit findings.

Real-time entry validation

It is not enough to just enter your EHS event information into a mobile device. You also want to make sure you are entering correct information. Modern EHS mobile tools can check your entry as you enter it, to match whatever criteria are established for that data. So you make sure that you’re entering a pH reading of 7.2, rather than 72. You can also use configurable pick lists to limit data entry to your specific desired entries and not have to deal with misspellings or 16 different ways to say “cloudy”. Make sure that pick lists are configurable and can be shared with each of your company’s devices.

Use your voice

We are starting to use voice recognition technology in our mobile devices to quickly send out text messages. Why not use it for recording audit comments or field issues? Voice recognition is getting better and better every year, and can get your comments onto a data collection form much faster than typing and can be especially useful for conditions where gloves are required and typing or stylus input is not practical. Using the phone’s native abilities, take advantage of voice feature to streamline note taking knowing you can always fix up any issues back in the office.

Unique and custom forms

For many EHS programs, you may have your own data collection needs that are specific to your facility or industry. Mobile EHS apps now allow you to tailor your input forms to add new data fields, remove unwanted fields, change some of the logic like making certain fields required, and make certain fields tied into established pick lists. Even better, you can match the mobile form exactly to the original paper form, making the transition to mobile simple and intuitive for staff.

Along with form customization options, modern mobile apps let you have many different forms in one app, so the folks tracking waste shipments have their form, while to folks performing facility audits have their forms, which may be specific to the facility of the audit itself. One app with many forms greatly streamlines the training aspect of deploying mobile and gives EHS managers great flexibility to easily update forms when regulations change.

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Top 10 cool features in Locus Mobile

Maybe you’re already using Locus’ iOS app for field data collection, or maybe you’re just curious about how it integrates with Locus’ cloud software. Either way, we’ve put together a list of the ten coolest features of Locus Mobile.

1. Locus Mobile works with both EIM and Locus Platform applications

The full-featured version of the Locus Mobile iOS application works for either Locus EIM or Locus Platform. This means that customers using both our key products can manage their work in a single, unified mobile application.

2. Get temporary coordinates for new sampling locations using the mobile device’s GPS

Locations can be added to EIM without coordinates (Latitude/Longitude or Northing/Easting). If a location without coordinates is used in a Provision File, the location will have a symbol associated with it (a symbol if coordinates are known). When a location with a triangle is selected, the user is prompted with the option to ‘Set Location’ – capture the current coordinates (Lat/Long) of where the user is located. When the provision file is loaded to EIM, the data manager will have the option to update the location in EIM with these coordinates. The accuracy of these mobile captured coordinates are below survey grade, but can be updated another time.

3. In EIM, more than one user can be assigned to a provision file– the data synced (uploaded) to EIM is separated based on the user that collected the data

If you’re not sure who will be sampling on a given day, you can assign multiple users to your provision files. Later, you can easily see who is responsible for certain sample collection data.

4. Locus Platform’s custom data type icons are displayed in Locus Mobile

Has your Locus Platform been customized to use specific icons and colors? These icons are also used in Locus Mobile, so if you use both Locus Platform and the mobile app, you’ll instantly recognize your data types while out in the field.

5. Check your sampling progress at any time during the sampling event, without having to search through your locations to see what locations you sampled and when

Although you can see the status on your map and location list, sometimes those lists are very long, and the map gets crowded when large field events are taking place. Tap the icon to see a log of the collected samples for the day.

6. You can set valid field data ranges with warnings or validation stops to help ensure you have not entered bad data

For EIM Locus Mobile users, when you’re collecting a lot of field data, the “fat finger” problem can make for some colorful data entry errors. That’s why we built in the ability to specify valid data ranges for any parameter— and provide a warning when you’re about to enter a bad value during field data collection.

7. Locus Mobile works offline

We know that not every field location is served by wireless or a strong cell signal, so Locus Mobile is built to keep working whether you’re online or offline. This gives you the flexibility to collect field data from anywhere, then sync back to Locus EIM or Locus Platform when you can.

8. You can configure default fields in Locus Mobile that will track with the dataset, but won’t show up in the field forms— making your forms less cluttered but still capturing all the information you need

Choose which required fields you want to be visible in Locus Mobile. You also have the option to include your optional field information without displaying them. This gives you control over which fields you see while in the field.

9. Search and filter for locations in a provision file

Dealing with a long list of locations? The search field above the location list lets you start typing the Location ID or Location Description to filter the list. Even better, the extent of the map will adjust to zoom to the matching selections!

10. Switch locations quickly with the QR code scanner

Locus Mobile can access your device’s camera and scan QR codes for quick and efficient retrieval of individual locations included in a given provision file.

Our product teams are constantly working to improve and add new functionality to Locus Mobile. If you’re a current user, please let your Locus Account Manager know if you have any ideas for how we can make your field data collection workflows faster and easier. If you’re not using Locus Mobile yet, please ask them for a free demo!

Celebrating 55 years of improving spatial thinking with GIS technology

Today, November 15, is GIS Day—an annual celebration established in 1999 to showcase the power and flexibility of geographical information systems (GIS).

Not only is GIS more powerful than ever before—it is also vastly more accessible. Anyone with Internet access can create custom maps based on publicly available data, from real-time traffic conditions to environmental risk factors, to local shark sightings. Software developers, even those at small companies or startups, now have access to APIs for integrating advanced GIS tools and functionality into their programs.

As the Director of EIM and GIS Development at Locus, I lead efforts to integrate GIS with our software applications to deliver our customers’ spatial data using the latest GIS technology. Let us take a look at how far GIS has come since I started working with it and at some of the new and exciting possibilities on the horizon.

Origins of GIS

Before you can understand where GIS is today, it helps to know how it started out. This year is the 55^th anniversary of the work done by Roger Tomlinson in 1962 with the Canada Land Inventory. We consider this the birth of GIS, and Mr. Tomlinson has been called the “father of GIS”.

The original GIS used computers and digitalization to “unlock” the data in paper maps, making it possible to combine data from multiple maps and perform spatial analyses. For example, in the image shown here from the Canada Land Inventory GIS, farms in Ontario are classified by revenue to map farm performance.

An early GIS system from the Canada Land Inventory, in Data for Decisions, 1967
Photo: Mbfleming. “Data for Decisions (1967).” YouTube, 12 Aug. 2007, https://youtu.be/ryWcq7Dv4jE.
Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

In 1969, Jack Dangermond founded Esri, which became the maker of, arguably, the world’s most popular commercial GIS software. Esri’s first commercial GIS, ARC/INFO, was released in 1982, and the simpler ArcView program followed in 1991. That year, 1991, is also the year I started working with GIS, although I used the TransCAD system from Caliper before starting with Esri software a few years later.

Back then, GIS work required expensive software packages installed on personal computers or large mainframe systems. There was no Google Maps; all map data had to be manually loaded into your software. Getting useful data into a GIS usually required extensive file manipulation and expertise in coordinate systems, projections, and geodesy.

While the government, utility, and resource management sectors used GIS heavily, there was not much consumer or personal use of GIS. As for me, I spent a lot of time in my first job digitizing paper maps by hand or trying to figure out why the map data I had loaded into a GIS was not lining up properly with an aerial photo.

Esri’s ArcView 3.2 for desktop computers (from the 1990s)
https://map.sdsu.edu/geog583/lecture/Unit-3.htm

The Google Revolution

How much has changed since those early days! After the release of OpenStreetMap in 2004, Google Maps and Google Earth in 2005, and Google Street View in 2007, GIS has been on an unstoppable journey—from only being used by dedicated GIS professionals on large computers in specific workplaces, to be accessible to anyone with an internet browser or a smartphone. High-quality map data and images—often the most expensive item in a GIS project in the 1990’s — are now practically free.

Just think how revolutionary it is that anyone can have instant access to detailed satellite images and road maps of almost anywhere on Earth! Not only can you perform such mundane tasks as finding the fastest route between two cities or locating your favorite coffee shop while on vacation—you can also see live traffic conditions for cities across the globe; view aerial images of countries you have never visited, and get street level views of exotic places. Back in 1991, such widespread access to free map data would have seemed like something straight out of science fiction.

Traffic conditions in London, 3:30 pm 10/16/2017, from Google Maps

South Base Camp, Mount Everest, Google StreetView

Mashups in the cloud

Obviously, the amount of spatial data needed to provide detailed coverage of the entire globe is far too large to be stored on one laptop or phone. Instead, the data is distributed across many servers “in the cloud.” Back in the 1990s, everything for one GIS system (data, processing engine, user interface) needed to be in the same physical place—usually one hard drive or server. Now, thanks to the internet and cloud computing, the data can be separate from the software, creating “distributed” GIS.

The combination of freely available data with distributed GIS and the power of smart phones has led us to the age of “neogeography”—in which anyone (with some technical knowledge) can contribute to online maps, or host their maps with data relevant to their personal or professional needs. GIS no longer requires expensive software or cartographical expertise; now, even casual users can create maps linking multiple data sources, all in the cloud.

Google’s MyMaps is an example of a tool for easily making your maps. Maps can range from the playful, such as locations of “Pokemon nests,” to the serious, such as wildfire conditions.

Google MyMaps of Pokemon Nest Locations
https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=1anyDs-H7hOtGQaxaTwuLjulUrVM&hl=en&usp=sharing

These online maps can be updated in real time (unlike paper maps) and therefore kept current with actual conditions. Such immediate response is instrumental in emergency management, where conditions can change rapidly, and both first responders and the public need access to the latest data.

Map showing wildfire and traffic conditions in northern California, 10/16/2017
https://google.org/crisismap/us-wildfires

Furthermore, software programmers have created online GIS tools that let non-coders create their maps. These tools push the boundaries of distributed GIS even further by putting the processing engine in the cloud with the data. Only the user interface runs locally for a given user. During this period of GIS history, I created several mashups, including one for viewing natural hazard risks for my hometown. For this application, I combined several data types, including property lines, flood plains, landslide vulnerability, and wildfire risk.

Floodplain data for Buncombe County, NC
https://buncombe-risk-tool.nemac.org

Programming GIS with APIs

Another significant advance in GIS technology is the ability to integrate or include advanced GIS tools and features in other computer programs. Companies such as Google and Esri have provided toolkits (called APIs, or application programming interfaces) that let coders access GIS data and functions inside their programs. While neogeography shows the power of personal maps created by the untrained public, computer programmers can use APIs to create some very sophisticated online GIS tools aimed at specific professionals or the public.

During my 10 years at Locus, I have helped create several such advanced GIS tools for environmental monitoring and data management. One example is the publicly-available Intellus application that Locus Technologies developed and hosts for the US Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory. It uses an Esri API and distributed GIS to provide access to aerial images and many decades of environmental monitoring data for the Los Alamos, NM area. Users can make maps showing chemical concentrations near their home or workplace, and they can perform powerful spatial searches (e.g., “find all samples taken within one mile of my house in the last year”). The results can be color-coded based on concentration values to identify “hot spots”.

Map from Intellus showing Tritium concentrations near a specified location
https://www.intellusnmdata.com

Locus Technologies also provides more sophisticated forms of analysis in its EIM cloud-based environmental management system. For example, contour lines can be generated on a map showing constant values of groundwater elevation, which is useful for determining water flow below ground. With such powerful spatial tools in the cloud, anyone at the organization, from facility managers to scientists, can easily create and share maps that provide insight into data trends and patterns at their site.

Groundwater contour map where each line is a 10 ft. interval, from the Locus EIM system

There’s a (map) app for that

One particularly exciting aspect of GIS today is the ability to use GIS on a smartphone or tablet. The GIS APIs mentioned above usually have versions for mobile devices, as well as for browsers. Programmers have taken advantage of these mobile APIs, along with freely available map data from the cloud, to create apps that seamlessly embed maps into the user experience. By using a smartphone’s ability to pinpoint your current latitude and longitude, these apps can create personalized maps based on your actual location.

A search in the Apple AppStore for “map” returns thousands of apps with map components. Some of these apps put maps front-and-center for traditional navigation, whether by car (Waze, MapQuest, Google), public transit (New York Subway MTA Map, London Tube Map), or on foot (Runkeeper, Map My Run, AllTrails). Other apps use maps in a supporting role to allow users to find nearby places; for example, banking apps usually have a map to show branches near your current location.

What’s really exciting are the apps that allow users to enter data themselves via a map interface. For example, HealthMap’s Outbreaks Near Me not only shows reports of disease outbreaks near your location, but it also lets you enter unreported incidents. The GasBuddy app shows the latest gasoline prices and lets you enter in current prices. This “crowdsourcing” feature keeps an app up-to-date by letting its users update the map with the latest conditions as they are happening.

The Outbreaks Near Me app for phones (left) and the GasBuddy app for tablets (right)

Here at Locus Technologies, we use the power of GIS in our Locus Mobile app for field data collection. Users can enter environmental data, such as temperature or pH measurements from a monitoring well, and upload the data back to the EIM cloud for later review and analysis. The Locus Mobile app includes a map interface for navigating to data collection points and tracking visited locations. The app also lets users create new data collection points “on the fly” simply by clicking on the map.

The map interface in the Locus Mobile app; blue dotted circles indicate locations that are not yet started.

Looking to the future

Where will GIS go from here? It’s possible that augmented reality, virtual reality, and 3D visualization will continue to expand and become as ubiquitous as the current “2D” maps on browsers and phones. Also, the “internet of things” will surely have a GIS component because every physical “thing” can be tied to a geographical location. Similarly, GIS can play an important role in “big data” by providing the spatial framework for analysis. It will be interesting to see where GIS is when we celebrate the 20^th GIS Day in 2019!

Thanks to the GIS Timeline for providing some of the history for this article.

About guest blogger— Dr. Todd Pierce, Locus Technologies

Dr. Pierce manages a team of programmers tasked with development and implementation of Locus’ EIM application, which lets users manage their environmental data in the cloud using Software-as-a-Service technology. Dr. Pierce is also directly responsible for research and development of Locus’ GIS (geographic information systems) and visualization tools for mapping analytical and subsurface data. Dr. Pierce earned his GIS Professional (GISP) certification in 2010.

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Interested in Locus’ GIS solutions?

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