We Are Loureiro: Laurel Crawford
April 8th, 2024
Laurel Crawford, Senior Project Manager, operates as a silent powerhouse behind the scenes at Loureiro. Leading the charge in managing Loureiro's treatability laboratory situated in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, Laurel plays an integral role in company operations.
Laurel was managing this lab while it operated as XDD Environmental, a consulting firm focusing on the evaluation, design, and implementation of diverse environmental remediation technologies for soil and groundwater. Acquired by Loureiro in 2022, these qualitative services are provided by the same team of experienced engineers and scientists - giving Loureiro a remarkable edge in the industry.
Laurel’s journey to XDD and, subsequently, Loureiro, involves a few different twists and turns.
“I grew up in upstate New York and attended SUNY Geneseo,” says Laurel. “I really didn’t know what I wanted to do going into my freshman year. It wasn’t until my sophomore year when I took a geology class that I started getting a sense of what I was interested in pursuing.”
Laurel found that the Geology department was a small one where the professors had a willingness to take students under their wing and provide a lot of guidance. After graduating with a Bachelor of Science degree in Geology, Laurel wasn’t positive which direction she wanted her career to take, and leaned on the resources and connections she’d made at the University to help her figure out her next steps.
“My academic advisor suggested that if I wasn’t completely sure, it made sense to go to graduate school to get a leg up on being qualified for a variety of positions.”
Laurel took that advice and segued to the University of New Hampshire (UNH) where she obtained her M.S. in Geochemistry – a combination of both of her interests. Post-graduation, her academic advisor at UNH knew someone in Florida looking for a research assistant for a two-year mercury study, and she moved to Florida and worked as a lab technician alongside other grad students.
Finding that she missed New England, Laurel moved back and was working for the federal Environmental Protection Agency in Boston when she received a call from a recruiter mentioning a position at XDD. That was in 2000, and Laurel has been here ever since.
“I’m really proud of the way the lab has grown over the years,” says Laurel. “I didn’t establish it, but I’ve been able to expand it into other technologies and areas of specialization since I took over managing it in 2013.”
Over the years, the treatability lab acquired equipment and procedures from a former Boston-area lab focused on the biological aspects of remediation. Laurel helped coordinate this initiative, learning more about these procedures and enveloping them into the existing service offerings.
“I can tell the way we’ve grown the lab has helped expand our customer base,” says Laurel. “We have a client that gives us a lot of work, and that makes me feel good knowing they are happy with what we offer and the job we do.”
Laurel is now working on getting the lab into the realm of testing vendor products.
“There are major companies that remediation products, and we have some folks coming into the lab who are interested in using us to help them test their products. It’s another potential revenue stream for us and it’s a testament to just how much we’ve grown.”
Outside of work, Laurel plays flute in a local orchestra. For a while, she owned and taught yoga classes at her own studio. She now teaches a class once a week at a Portsmouth area brewery.
