Hydrolox S1800 Screens Eliminate Manual Debris Removal at Northumbrian Water Treatment Facility

Customer Objectives

Northumbrian Water’s existing screens at the riverside intake of their Warkworth, England, water treatment facility did not comply with the Eels (England and Wales) Regulations 2009. Northumbrian Water approached us anticipating that Hydrolox technology would eliminate fish and eel entrapment to make their operation fully compliant, unaware of the additional benefits our intake screens would bring downstream.

Hydrolox Execution

Hydrolox engineers collaborated with JN Bentley—a civil engineering company and Northumbrian Water’s framework partner for infrastructure projects—to develop an in-river solution for the intake. We replaced the existing dual-flow band screens with two Hydrolox Series 1800 water screens. The S1800 screens were custom designed to meet the 55 ML/day inflow required by Northumbrian Water operations and the 0.25 m/sec approach velocity required by the Environment Agency.

Results

As expected, the new Hydrolox screens are fully compliant with all regulations. An added benefit since installing the S1800 water screens is that all debris is captured and removed at the intake, eliminating the 600–800 hours previously spent manually cleaning the fixed screens downstream each year.

With the old intake screens, the fixed screens required manual debris removal once or twice per shift under normal conditions and—even worse—up to hourly removal during flooding and other high-debris events. Manual cleaning consistently required at least two operators, but during the high-debris events—which occurred 60–90 days out of the year—additional personnel were brought in to assist with treatment tasks. With the Hydrolox screens installed at the intake, personnel now inspect the fixed screens only once or twice per week as a precaution and instead perform other maintenance tasks at the treatment facility. Northumbrian Water is so pleased that they’ve installed Hydrolox screens at four other sites