Williamson Water & Land Advisory

ADDING VALUE THROUGH SUSTAINABLE AND EFFICIENT USE OF NATURAL AND RENEWABLE RESOURCES

Established in January 2015. WWLA has built an enviable reputation as a high quality technical service provider in hydrological, hydrogeological, contaminated land, rural infrastructure, RMA planning and remote sensing services.

Williamson Water & Land Advisory is a New Zealand based, employee owned niche environmental consultancy offering water and land related science, planning, engineering and contamination services. We pride ourselves on our client focus, extremely high standard of specialist technical expertise and achieving our aim of becoming long term trusted advisors.

We would be pleased to discuss our service offering to meet your requirements, so please do not hesitate to make contact with us.

Projects

Otawere Water Storage Reservoir

WWLA successfully obtained resource consent from Northland Regional Council to authorise the Otawere Water Storage Reservoir ...

Pukenui Solar Farm

WWLA has been involved in a range of solar farm consenting projects across New Zealand. This includes preparing preliminary planning assessment, ...

Ruahuwai (Upper Waikato) Catchment Model

WWLA were commissioned to develop and calibration a MODFLOW, MT3DMS and MODPATH models for flow, nitrate-N and ...

Community

WWLA are proud to share our success by giving back to the communities we live and work in.

News

Shane Moore Represents WWLA at the Auckland ALGA Event

On 19 February 2025, WWLA Principal Contaminated Land Advisor, Shane Moore, presented at the Auckland ALGA Branch Event titled, " Remember Groundwater? It’s in our Name, Make Sure It’s Part of Your Game ." The event was held at GHD headquarters and focused on whether soil-focused contaminated land regulation has led to lesser attention to groundwater effects. Shane introduced the regulatory context concerning contaminated groundwater. He discussed the unintended consequences of current legislation, highlighting issues such as managed fill applications neglecting groundwater pathways, inconsistent sampling methods, and the lack of comprehensive groundwater assessments. Shane emphasised the need for clearer regulations and increased industry awareness to protect groundwater quality. He also addressed emerging contaminants like PFAS and the challenges posed by current regulatory mechanisms, advocating for updates to national and regional guidelines. Joining Shane were Simon Hunt, Technical Director at EHS Support New Zealand Ltd, who presented on groundwater data collection methods, and Laura Buckthought, Senior Freshwater Scientist at Auckland Council, who shared insights from Auckland Council’s long-term groundwater monitoring program and recent findings on nitrate transport and transformation mechanisms in Pukekohe volcanic aquifers. The event facilitated a discussion on how the industry might address the challenges highlighted by the speakers, raising awareness of groundwater contamination effects. A video recording of the full talk is available for ALGA members through the ALGA members portal. https://landandgroundwater.com/

Bore Take Consent Service: Ensuring Continued Groundwater Access for Our Community

Water is essential for any community, and at Williamson Water & Land Advisory (WWLA), we're committed to ensuring residents and businesses have secure and sustainable access to this vital resource. Recently, we've seen an increase in bore consent renewals as bores in aquifer management zones are often on common expiry dates. Consequently, our team has been hard at work assisting clients in navigating this important process. Our dedicated team handles these projects with precision and care, ensuring that every application meets the necessary requirements for approval, hence each project demonstrates our commitment to providing a high-quality service and support for our clients. This ensures they can continue to access and use bore water efficiently and legally, which is crucial for winery production, dairy shed washdown, and irrigation of orchards and market gardens. We carry out the necessary technical assessments to obtain resource consent, aiming for a consent duration of 35 years. This is the maximum permissible under the Resource Management Act (RMA), provided the aquifer resource is not considered to be under pressure or close to allocation limits, and the applicant has a significant investment in the site that relies on a long-term secure water supply. Jon Williamson, a Waimauku resident for over 25 years is well-familiar with the local aquifers, and spent over 20 years with global multidisciplinary consultancies in Auckland and Sydney before establishing WWLA in Waimauku/Kumeu in 2015. The company has steadily grown and he now leads a team of approximately 25 permanent staff members. Why Choose Us? Expertise : Our team is well-versed in the intricate details of bore take consent applications, ensuring a smooth and hassle-free process. Local Knowledge : Being part of the Kumeu community, we understand the unique challenges and requirements of our local area. Comprehensive Service : From initial consultation to final submission, we handle every step of the application process, providing our clients with peace of mind. Securing bore water access shouldn't be a hassle. At WWLA, we're here to simplify the bore consent renewal process for our clients.

WWLA Announces the Promotion of Jennie Haines to Operations Manager

WWLA is pleased to announce the promotion of Jennie Haines to the position of Operations Manager, effective 1 January 2025. In this role, Jennie will be responsible for HR Management, Financial Management, HSE Compliance, Administrative Management, Marketing and Communications, and Assets and Insurance Management. Since joining WWLA in July 2022, Jennie’s previous role as Administration Manager has steadily grown and she has become an invaluable member of the WWLA team. She has a great knowledge of company processes and protocols, has consistently demonstrated exceptional knowledge of business operations management, and is always thinking about innovative ways to improve efficiency. Jennie has become the sounding board for staff for go-to advice on any matter. Jennie also has a strong interest and commitment to the promotion of the company, and was accepted as a shareholder in 2024. We are confident that Jennie's expertise, leadership and strong people skills will continue to be instrumental in driving WWLA's growth and success in the years to come. Please join us in congratulating Jennie Haines on this well-deserved promotion!

WWLA Celebrates 10 years!

This week is the 10th anniversary of WWLA. To mark this milestone, we have taken a look at how much the company has grown and how much we have achieved over the last decade. The company has grown from our founding staff member Jon Williamson to a highly skilled team of 24 water, contaminated land and planning professionals; We have expanded from a desk in a home office to 3 offices, spanning Auckland, Whangarei and Papamoa; The company is employee-owned and now comprises a strong nucleus of 10 shareholders – all of which are leaders in various ways in the company; Over the 10 years, the company has worked on 1400 projects for over 500 client organisations. We are currently providing advice to nearly 200 active clients; We are proud to be delivering repeat projects for some of New Zealand’s strongest companies such as Auckland International Airport, BT Mining, Channel Infrastructure, Contact Energy, Fletcher Building, Foodstuffs North Island, Fulton Hogan Land Development, Mainfreight, Ministry of Education, Oceana Gold, Southern Pastures, Summerset Group Holdings, Taharoa Ironsands, Talleys Group and Wairakei Pastoral, amongst a range of less known but equally important clients. When asked about his founding values and what makes WWLA successful, Jon Williamson, founder and Managing Director responded with “First and foremost we are a professional technical advisory company - we must never forget our roots nor get distracted with meaningless tasks. WWLA is successful because our approach to clients is based on: being highly responsive and efficient; providing a problem-solving ethos; providing easy access to Senior and Principal level staff; and having an acute ability to tailor our approach to suit our client’s needs - aimed at generating a strong value proposition". It is such an achievement to reach this 10-year milestone and be in such a strong market position. We are extremely grateful to our clients, who have placed their trust and faith in WWLA. None of this would have been possible without the support and engagement of our WWLA team. We are very lucky to employ such incredibly talented people and enjoy creating an environment for them to prosper and grow. We are very excited about the future of the company and can’t wait to see where we are in another 10 years.