Horizontal Directional Drilling

Advantages of HDD

Environmental Benefits

There are numerous environmental benefits to usingHDD. In fact, for some parts of the United States, thistechnology has become the only acceptable solution for crossing under waterways and wetlands. Since HDD providesfor limited disturbance of land and water, it is indeed anideal technology as there is no excavation except for the entry and exit pit.The numerous benefits provided are:

• No disturbance to wetland and wildlife habitat
• Minimal water and land pollution
• Minimal impact, if any, to steep slopes and sediment
• Decreased need to dispose of unsuitable material
• Minimal impact to historical and cultural sites

Feasible Option for Congested Areas

Modern society has built its infrastructure and urbanenvironment to the point where it is highly difficult toconstruct new utilities in these developed areas. This section will give a few examples of projects which werecompleted by HDD, not necessarily because of cost,environmental or social reasons, but because there was noother option which was really possible. Directional Drilling was used for the installation of numerouswater mains. It isbecoming more popular to use HDD to install force watermains.Directional drilling was selected for the projectbecause of numerous reasons.

These include:

• Many buried utilities in the area, including fiber-optic cable - HDD is capable of going lower than them without interruption
• Avoid interrupting traffic on the busiest streets / roads
• Eliminate damage to retaining walls and otherstructures on the right-of-way

Social Benefits

Social benefits are a definite advantage of HDD. Withthe relatively minor obstruction and digging required withthe entry and exit pits, there is usually no disruption toroadways, waterways, public and private property. Thesetypes of benefits are definitely a soft truth rather than ahard truth like cost savings. Nevertheless, the socialbenefits alone could be reason to use HDD.