WET News

"Having simpli ed the group, we are focused on our core markets in the UK and US…" Leo Quinn, Balfour Beatty. P3 News+ Voluntary code allows businesses delivering SuDS to apply a risk-based approach to minimising the environmental impact of the di• use pollution from run-o• . P4 Onsite: Could props enable a large excavation to be carried out in very diƒ cult ground conditions at a Welsh water treatment works? P11 Insight: Odour control Limited access and space availability proved a challenge when it came to overcoming odour issues at a Yorkshire Water pumping station. P12-13 WET NEWS WATER AND EFFLUENT TREATMENT NEWS Research facility will help to develop ideas and technologies to manage water network. Multmillion-pound nding to tackle water infrastructure APRIL 2017 Volume 23 • Issue 4 Record £20M ne for Thames Water "This project couldn't have been done using slide rules..." Drummond Modley, Wessex Water. P10 Suez and CDPQ buys GE Water for €3.2bn A £3.7M investment has been announced to enable researchers from the University of She eld's She eld Water Centre, which contains the UK's largest urban water research group, to develop new, more scienti- c ways to better manage distributed water infrastructure. The University of She eld will host the Distributed Urban Water Infrastructure facility as part of the UK Collaboratorium for Research in Infrastructure and Cities (UKCRIC), a consortium comprising about 14 major UK universities. These universities will collaborate on all aspects of infrastructure, from road and rail to water and power. This new facility will enable researchers from throughout the UK to investigate and develop innovative ways to tackle the UK's deteriorating distributed water infrastructure. These full-scale facilities will be used to study water and sewer pipes and ancillary structures to: • Investigate deterioration and failure mechanisms • In-pipe biological, chemical and physical processes • Flooding • Corrosion processes The new facility will also deliver translational research and development to accelerate and broker long-term collab- oration between water utilities and technology providers. The funding comes from the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) via the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) as part of a £138M government investment in UKCRIC, recognition of the importance of improving infrastructure performance in the UK. Professor Martin May- eld leads the UKCRIC work at the University of She eld, and the NEED TO KNOW • The funding is part a government investment in UKCRIC • Fourteen universities make up UKCRIC • The new facility will be located next to the University's Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre • The facility will study water and sewer pipes, as well as ancillary structures projected research will be organised in three streams, each headed by a senior academic: Professor Simon Tait (System Performance), Pro- fessor Joby Boxall (Asset Failure) and Professor Kiril Horoshenkov (Future Water Stream). Tait, Professor of Water Engineering at the University of She eld, said: "The facility at She eld will be a national resource in which researchers will be able to come and develop new ideas and technologies to help the UK better manage its large water distribution and sewer networks. These are key infrastructure systems that impact on the lives of everyone in the UK and they face pressures from an increasing population, a changing climate and physical deterioration." Simon Tait, Professor of Water Engineering at the University of She eld, said: "The facility at She eld will be a national resource in which researchers will be able to come and develop new ideas and technologies to help the UK better manage its large water distribution and sewer networks. "These are key infrastructure systems that impact on the lives of everyone in the UK and they face pressures from an increasing population, a changing climate and physical deterioration." t. 0800 8046 062 www.atiuk.com Continuous water quality monitors for distribution networks Network Monitoring_90x265_Wet News.indd 1 13/03/2017 20:15 T hames Water has been hit with a record £20.3M - ne for polluting the River Thames with 1.4 billion litres of raw sewage. The company was ordered to pay £19.75M plus costs in Aylesbury Crown Court for oŸ ences at six facilities in the Thames Valley during 2012-14. This is by far the largest penalty imposed on a water company for an environmental breach. The company was prosecuted for each of the six pollution oŸ ences collectively by the Environment Agency. The facilities involved were - ve sewage treatment works in Aylesbury, Didcot, Henley, Little Marlow and Arbor- eld, and Littlemore sewage pumping station. Thames Water chief exe- cutive Steve Robertson said the company "deeply regretted" each of the six incidents. "We asked for these incidents to be considered and sentenced together, because it was clear that our performance in this part of our region, at that time, was not up to the very high standards that we and our customers expect," he said. S uez and Canada's Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec (CDPQ) are buying GE Water & Process Tech- nologies from General Electric Company for €3.2bn in an all- cash transaction. The deal is subject to customary closing conditions. GE Water is a leading systems and services provider, sup- plying state-of-the-art water, wastewater and process systems solutions to blue-chip customers. It generated $2.1bn revenues in 2016. The transaction will make Suez a leader in water resource management. Jean-Louis Chaussade, Suez chief executive o cer of Suez, said: "I look forward to inte- grating GE Water's highly skilled staŸ to our teams to form an unparalleled industrial water platform. We are also thrilled to join forces with CDPQ, which shares our long- term vision for our business." Michael Sabia, president and chief executive o cer at CDPQ, said GE Water's cutting-edge technology has positioned it as a key player in the water treatment industry.

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