Sykes Pumps has enabled construction of an improved spillway at Stanford Reservoir near Lutterworth
The project involved working with a specialist contractor who was doubling the capacity of the existing spillway for Severn Trent Water. The spillway is designed to ensure that any excess capacity in the water catchment reservoir is released into the River Avon to prevent the potential risk of flooding. By doubling the width of the spillway from six metres to 12 metres, the project has delivered more robust management of future water levels.
Finding a pumping solution to reduce the water depth in the reservoir from six metres to four metres was challenging because the project team had to ensure that no equipment weighing more than 10 tonnes was transported over the crest of the reservoir, adhering to strict loading limits.
Explains Chris Graham from Sykes Pumps: “The site team needed a discharge rate of around 1000 litres/second in order to reduce the water level within the required project time frame and Sykes Pumps visited site to advise on the potential options having reviewed the layout of the site and the loading restrictions for the crest.
“We then provided full proposals for both submersibles and 12” diesel pumps, including where the equipment could be located to avoid weight on the crest and the diesel pump solution was selected as the preferred option.”
Sykes Pumps provided three 12” Super Wispaset 300 diesel pumps along with fuel cubes and pipework to enable 24/7 over-pumping of water from the reservoir to the tail bay at the base of the spillway and out into the River Avon. Each pump is capable of a maximum flow rate of 415 litres/second and Sykes Pumps also provided two 4” Super Wispaset 100 diesel pumps as standby equipment in case the flow rate needed to be increased due to heavy rainfall, or if one of the 12” pumps had to be taken offline.
The reservoir’s water level was reduced to the required depth within one month of the over-pumping operation and the pumps remained on site throughout the spillway construction to ensure any additional pumping requirements were met.
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