Overview
JBA Consulting is one of the world’s leading environmental and engineering consultancies. Their UK wide ecology team consists of 46 ecologists who tackle a diverse range of projects, from UKHab and BNG baseline assessments to NVC, breeding bird, and protected species surveys.
Two years ago, the team moved away from paper-based methods to Coreo. The goal was simple: streamline field surveys, increase data accuracy, and reclaim time lost to manual admin. We spoke to ecologists Catherine Porter and Sky Wallis to see how that transition has transformed their day-to-day operations.
The Challenge: The “Metric Headache”
The JBA team handles a high volume of Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG) assessments. Historically, manually filling out the statutory metric spreadsheets was a tedious and time-consuming process. Even a minor change – like a client slightly shifting a site boundary – required frustrating manual recalculations across the entire dataset.
The Solution: Automation at the Click of a Button
When the team adopted Coreo, the impact on their efficiency was immediate. Sky Wallis initially used the platform for bird surveys and saw massive time savings through Coreo’s digital mapping tools:
“For a suite of six breeding bird surveys, Coreo helps us save between six to twelve hours on the mapping alone.”
Sky Wallis | Ecologist
The savings didn’t stop there. NVC surveys, which previously involved manually typing up hundreds of quadrats across multiple projects, are now automated. This shift alone has saved the team days of administrative work.
For BNG assessments, the “click-of-a-button” export to the metric has been a game-changer:
“Coreo saves our team half a day’s work per BNG assessment.”
Sky Wallis | Ecologist
Field-Tested: Reliability in the Rain
Transitioning to a new system on a major project can be daunting. Catherine Porter was initially uncertain about using Coreo for a large-scale upland BNG baseline assessment. However, the decision paid off, allowing her to deliver results to the client much faster than expected.
The benefits were especially clear when the British weather took a turn for the worst. Because Coreo is digital, Catherine no longer had to juggle multiple soggy sheets of paper in the rain.
The real “lightbulb moment” came when the client challenged the site’s redline boundary. In the past, this would have meant hours of manual re-work. Instead, Sky showed Catherine how easy it was to adjust the boundary within Coreo and instantly re-export the updated data to the metric.
Beyond Speed : Key Benefits of Coreo
While time savings are the headline, the team identified several other key benefits:
- Standardisation: Mandatory form fields ensure all data is collected correctly the first time – eliminating missing notes or mixed units of measurement.
- Audit Assurance: Everything – data, photos, and locations – is stored in one central place, providing a clear audit trail.
- GPS Precision: No more guessing positions in tricky terrain like dense woodland.
- Real-time Collaboration: In the field, the team can see in real-time which areas have been covered, preventing overlap and ensuring total site coverage.
- Multi-layer Mapping: Instant toggling between base maps improves situational awareness
Peace of Mind
Coreo hasn’t just sped up the workflow; it has reduced the high-pressure associated with complex ecology surveys and giving the ecologists reassurance that they haven’t forgotten to record any key pieces of information. Today, Sky uses Coreo for every aspect of her work:
“Even if I don’t think I’ll need Coreo on a site, I’ll still set up a project. If I need to add a note or a photo, I drop them into Coreo and I know I can’t lose the data or forget about it.”
Sky Wallis | Ecologist