WET News

2 WET NEWS JANUARY COMMENT "There will be no transition period during which time work stalls" JANUARY 2% Southern Water has reduced its carbon footprint by 2% in real terms in the past two years, despite the pressures of population growth and increased environmental standards, the utility has revealed as it is re-certi„ ed by the Carbon Trust. "Sally is an experienced senior leader who has a strong track-record of getting the best out of people and technology" Interserve boss Debbie White on Sally Cabrini (left) moving from United Utilities to Interserve as director of transformation, IT and people from January 18. 400 £1M £100K Stirling Council and Scottish Water Horizons have received £100,000 to study how waste heat from Callander Wastewater Treatment Works can be distributed to remote and oŒ -gas grid areas. 2.4% Ofwat's initial view of the cost of capital in RPI terms, which would be a record low for a regulated utility. "Most leaks from our pipes do not come to the surface, and so are hard to identify." Jason Griffin, Yorkshire Water's leakage team leader in West Yorkshire, as the utility trials Israeli company Utilis' satellite water leakage detection technology on its pipes in Halifax and Keighley. "...it „ lls me with pride and excitement to be given this opportunity to head this organisation as president." Duncan Lewis, managing director of Xylem Water Solutions UK, on becoming president of the British Pump Manufacturers Association. £28M NI Water has forked out £28M to buy Kelda Water Services' holdings in four treatment plants. The deal brings all clean water production in Northern Ireland back into NI Water ownership. Is the end of the AMP cycle rollercoaster ride getting nearer? I t may be too early to praise industry regulator Ofwat, but I'm going to do it anyway. Ofwat wants water companies to align their performance commitment targets with the forecasted upper quartile performance of their peers in the • rst year of AMP7 – and without a transition period! According to AECOM's Adrian Rees, this move will force water companies to invest more in the latter stages of the current AMP6, which comes to an end on March 31, 2020. As we all know, the last 18 months or so of the • ve-yearly regulatory cycle is traditionally when there is a downturn for the industry's contractors and suppliers. Great strides were made in run-up to AMP6 starting to try and break this tradition through early involvement initiatives only for a spanner to be thrown in to the works with the introduction of a totex culture, and ODIs. This time round, however, Ofwat is making its expectations for AMP7 and beyond very clear. It wants the water companies to improve the resilience of their services, as well as plan long term and develop smart solutions to address the pressures of a growing population and climate change. If water companies have to invest more during the remainder of AMP6, then that is a good thing and should go a long way to consigning the AMP cycle rolleroaster to the scrapheap. There will be no transition period during which time work stalls for contractors and suppliers. That's a good thing. The only negative I can see is the pressure this will put on resources when there's a dearth of engineers. Water Industry Awards entries deadline extended! Don 't forget to enter the Water Industry Awards 2018 as there are only a few days le" in which to enter. The deadline for entries has been extended to January 14. The awards, organised by WET News and WWT, celebrate and reward forward thinking and best practice in the water industry. There are a variety of categories to choose from including four new ones: Water Company of the Year, Water Industry Contractor of the Year, Sludge & Resource Recovery Initiative of the Year, and Water Resilience Initiative of the Year. Check them out wwtonline. co.uk/awards, where you can also see our fantastic judging line-up; get a downloadable entry pack; and • nd details of sponsors Concrete Pipeline Systems Association (CPSA), Nomenca Group, and Asset International (Weholite) All companies can enter – large or small – with the winners crowned at a prestigious gala event on May 21, 2018 at The Vox, Birmingham. Best of luck! IN A NUTSHELL Welsh Water is now invest- ing more than £1M a day – more than ever before – in its services. With more than 400 diŒ erent schemes currently being carried out to help improve water and wastewater services, £196M was invested between April and September 2017 and a total of £400M planned to be invested in the year to March 2018. This forms part of its £1.7bn investment programme 2015-2020. A nglian Water is putting drought, ¤ ooding, sus- tainable growth, carbon neutrality and improving the environment at the core of its operations for the next 25 years. The strategy is part of the com- pany's vision for the future out- lined in its new "bold manifes- to". The document is a revital- ised version of Anglian Water's Strategic Direction Statement (SDS), • rst published a decade ago. The original SDS high- lighted climate change and population growth as the two biggest challenges facing the company. The updated docu- ment acknowledges those chal- lenges remain but builds on them, and the responses the company proposes. Its publication follows a con- sultation process that under- lined how customer needs and expectations – and those of the region – have changed since the publication of the • rst SDS. The importance of a¦ ordable bills and increased support for cus- tomers in vulnerable circum- stances features prominently in the revised document. The new SDS outlines four stretching and long-term goals that have been agreed with customers: § Water utility to focus on four long-term goals having revised its Strategic Direction Statement. Anglian Water outlines 25-year vision in 'bold manifesto' ● To make the east of England resilient to the risks of drought and ¤ ooding ● To enable sustainable eco- nomic and housing growth in the UK's fastest growing region ● To become a carbon neutral business by 2050 ● To work with others to achieve signi• cant improvement in ecological quality across our catchments The document paints a pic- ture of the long term, 25-year context for the region. This is the backdrop against which Anglian's • ve-year business plan for 2020-2025 will be writ- ten next year. In the SDS, the company makes clear that all of its work will be underpinned by a continued focus on helping those customers that need it most, and a¦ ordable bills, acknowledging the continued pressure on household budgets. Anglian has highlighted six challenges, and outlined the company's response to each. Three are common to the whole of the water industry: a¦ orda- bility and customer expecta- tions; the need to plan for the long term; and changing mar- kets, structure and • nancing of the industry. Three challenges are felt to be particularly acute in the east of England: climate change; population and eco- nomic growth; and the need for environmental protection. Alex Plant, Anglian Water's director of regulation, said: "When we wrote our business plan for the • ve years between 2015 and 2020, we engaged around 50,000 customers in detailed conversations on what matters most to them. We spoke to both household and business customers, and wider stake- holders, to create a set of out- comes that we all agreed really matter – and we committed to deliver them. "Our SDS builds on those outcomes. What was hugely enriching for us was the depth of engagement we were able to have with the advisory panel we created. We're con• dent we changed their view of us – but in response to their challenges, we have also changed our com- mitments. We think the docu- ment is substantially better for this detailed engagement." Greater commitments have also been made in the pub- lished document to smart metering, and engaging devel- opers and customers on water- eª cient homes. AB17-1029 www.pumpmix.co.uk sales@pumpmix.co.uk Tel: 01487 830123 MEAN MACHINE FOG, RAG, PLASTIC and any other solid or brous debris will cause blockages and disruption with costly downtime to all process streams from STRAWBERRIES to SEWAGE. 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