Building upon the pioneering discoveries of 19^th century scientist Michael Faraday and 1960’s Bell Labs research, Alberta Pipefinders uses modern, multi-channel, high-voltage transmitters and ultra-sensitive receivers to give the most accurate results possible when locating buried facilities. Specialized equipment such as ground penetrating radar, electronic stethoscopes, and ECDA current mapping tools are utilized in areas where traditional locating equipment fails.

Traditional and modern surveying practices are utilized to ensure the precision of both the fieldwork and the documentation the fieldwork produces. Members of our field staff are required to attend a stringent training regimen in surveying, EM signal theory, Locating theory and practices, and methods of grounding and bonding.

Our field crews are equipped with the latest information technology, including several subscription services such as Abadata Lite and EGIS, which provide our crews with updated information on pipelines and wellsites, legal survey plans, and construction as-built plots. In addition, we employ mapping technology such as GPS-enabled Streets/Trips and Google Earth / Google Maps, and hard copy maps (Generally 1:50000 forest series). Our field crews are provided with a compiled document containing all job info, including survey, mapping, and access. This document is provided to our crews in both electronic format and also in hard copy, to guard against computer failure.

All API personnel are certified to perform locating and mapping services to our clients. Qualification is achieved through factory training, industry certification, in-house certification, and experience gained through supervised field training. All API field staff have a minimum of locator training level III, which consists of 16 hours of classroom training and 40 hours of hands-on instruction. All technicians are guided and overseen by their field supervisors, and a passing mark is required prior to a technician being deemed qualified to perform supervised work

Our technicians are trained to follow API’s standards, which meet or exceed the local jurisdiction’s standards. Personnel are trained in public relations and are always clean, friendly, courteous, and knowledgeable. Our crews always respect the environment, the landowners, our clients, and the public at large.