SDS Limited

Achieving consent tightening and providing treatment resilience using new activated sludge process with enhanced biological phosphorus removal

Five interconnected rows of Weholite pipe designed to capture stormwater before gradually release it back to a pumping station when conditions stabilise

Safeguarding the River Leam with surface water separation, pumped & gravity storage, and network optimisation

Safeguarding properties and business with sustainable and innovative interventions

Heigham Water Treatment Works (WTW) has supplied clean water to the City of Norwich for more than 100 years. The treatment works supplied an average 42 Ml/d of water into the Norwich Public Water Supply Zone serving a population in excess of 200,000. The £36m scheme was the largest capital investment project within Anglian Water’s […]

The Hereford Water Network is dependent on a single source of supply from the River Wye and Dŵr Cymru Welsh Water identified a need to assess the resilience of the network to maintain customer supply during any future loss of source supply events. The resulting hydraulic assessment identified the requirement to increase the available storage […]

Located to the east of Stafford, Severn Trent’s Brancote Sewage Treatment Works (STW) catchment will see an increase in population from 78,075 current population equivalent (PE) to 85,532 by 2028. The site is split into two distinct areas with the STW processing the sewage flows from within its own catchment and the sludge treatment centre […]

The Birmingham Resilience Project (BRP) is designed to provide a backup source of raw water from the River Severn to the water treatment works that serves Birmingham. During planned or unplanned outages of the primary water source, the raw water system will abstract water from the River Severn between October and March and supply 117 […]

Raw water has been collected in reservoirs in the Elan Valley in Wales and transferred 118km under gravity through an aqueduct to the water treatment works (WTW) in Birmingham for treatment and distribution to the city’s residents and industries since the beginning of the 20th century. The original infrastructure was constructed over 100 years ago, […]

Durleigh Water Treatment Centre is located approximately 2km west of Bridgwater, Somerset and is Wessex Water’s second largest surface water treatment works serving a population of 44,500. The site was originally designed to treat up to 28.5 Ml/d, with water drawn down from the 959,000m3 Durleigh Impounding Reservoir. Raw water quality has deteriorated in recent […]

The large, industrial town of Ellesmere Port in Cheshire is experiencing population growth, thanks to excellent transport links and an array of employment opportunities. The local population is set to rise by a further 10% by 2036, to over 76,000, so upgrades to the Ellesmere Port WwTW are necessary to cope with increased throughput. The […]

Helston is located at the northern end of the Lizard Peninsula in Cornwall and the lower town has suffered from a long history of flooding from the River Cober. This ultimately prompted the development of a flood alleviation scheme (FAS) in 1989. However, following these works, there were further flood events in 1993, 1999, 2003 […]

Hookstone Road CSO in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, is a CSO chamber with upstream and downstream online storage provided by large diameter pipes. During storm events, pass forward flow is restricted by the 200mm outlet pipe and 90 degree bend downstream and partially fills the storage pipes before excess flows pass through a screen at the […]

Located to the West of the town of Banchory, Aberdeenshire, Scottish Water’s Invercannie WTW is currently a 49 Ml/d water treatment works which serves the local population as well as providing raw and treated water to Mannofield WTW in Aberdeen via two 28km aqueducts (one laid in 1866 and the other in 1924). The treatment […]

Yorkshire Water’s Langsett Water Treatment Works (WTW) is located 17km north-west of Sheffield in South Yorkshire, on the edge of the Peak District National Park. The WTW treats raw water which is extracted by gravity from two upland impounding reservoirs at Langsett (adjacent to the WTW) and nearby Midhope (approximately 1km south-east of the site). […]

Llyn Brenig impounding reservoir is located in the Denbigh Moors in North Wales. It was constructed in 1975 and was officially opened by the Prince of Wales. It forms part of the River Dee regulation to manage flow into the Dee via the Afon Alwen. The reservoir has a capacity of around 60 million cubic […]

Murton WTW is fed by six boreholes and supplies up to 350m3/hour of potable water to Berwick-upon-Tweed and surrounding areas, serving over 7,500 properties. The boreholes which feed the Berwick Water Supply Zone can contain turbidity, particularly when flows are high, interrupted or varied. The existing treatment process was unable to remove the turbidity, causing […]

Newham Sewage Treatment Works is located on the outskirts of Truro, Cornwall. The site treats wastewater from the city and the surrounding areas which are experiencing a rapid population growth. A £6.8m project was sanctioned by South West Water in May 2018 to provide a new secondary process stream, utilising the novel Nereda granular activated […]

Westnewton is a small village about three and a half miles from the Solway coast at Allonby and eight miles west of the market town of Wigton. The wastewater treatment works is situated on a hillside above the village and treats wastewater for 275 population equivalent (PE) from the village and the local area. The […]

Withernsea is located in Yorkshire, approximately 18 miles east of Hull on the Holderness Coast. The area is vulnerable to coastal erosion due to the geology being mainly soft boulder clay. Groynes and sea walls being installed in Bridlington and Hornsea have affected the longshore drift, which has caused Withernsea area beaches to narrow, providing […]

Anchorsholme Park is located on the coast 4 miles north of Blackpool Tower. The long sea outfall (LSO) project is the third of three phases contributing to improving bathing waters on the Fylde Coast. The objective of the overall scheme is to complete the AMP6 obligations on the Fylde Coast of the ‘moving towards three […]

Anchorsholme Park is located on the coast 4 miles north of Blackpool Tower. The outfall pumping station project is the second of three phases contributing to improving bathing waters on the Fylde coast. The objective of the overall scheme is to complete the AMP5 obligations on the Fylde Coast of the ‘moving towards three spills […]

Barston Sewage Treatment Works (STW) is one of Severn Trent’s medium sized treatment works. The site is located to the east of Birmingham in the West Midlands. The STW treats foul water for the catchment serving Solihull, Shirley, Knowle and other outlying conurbations. It currently serves a population of 39,741 which will increase to 76,036. […]

Both Blackburn WwTW and Darwen WwTW discharge final and storm effluent to watercourses that are tributaries of the River Darwen, feeding into the River Ribble and ultimately impacting on the bathing waters of the Fylde coast. Following on from the Blackburn and Darwen WwTWs (2017) article and Blackburn and Darwen WwTWs (2018) article, both published […]

Boughton STW is a medium sized sewage treatment works serving a population equivalent of approximately 13,000 located about 8 miles south-east of Worksop in Nottinghamshire. As part of Severn Trent’s commitment to the Water Framework Directive (WFD) to improve the quality of waterbodies in the region within AMP6, Boughton STW was highlighted to accept a […]

Located in South Ayrshire, Scotland, Bradan Water Treatment Works (WTW) has a capacity of 120 Ml/day, with an output of approximately 70 Ml/day. The existing treatment processes comprise aluminium sulphate coagulation, dissolved air flotation, primary filtration, manganese contactors, orthophosphate dosing, lime and disinfection. The works supplies a large area along the west coast of Scotland, […]

Since the beginning of the 20th century, raw water has been conveyed 118km from the Elan Valley in Wales, under gravity by aqueduct, to the water treatment works (WTW) in Birmingham for treatment and supply to the population of the city. The aqueduct has been in continuous service for over 100 years and requires some […]

Severn Trent (ST) and Hafren Dyfrdwy (HD) have been challenged to meet a large number of new, tight phosphorus permits as a result of the Water Framework Directive (WFD). Historically, only Total-P levels down to 1 mg/l have been enforced by the Environment Agency, but in AMP6 and AMP7 a big step change in expectations […]

The Coleshill Food Waste Anaerobic Digestion Plant processes 48,500 tonnes per annum of food waste collected generally within 30 miles of the site. The site has been in continuous operation since January 2015 when it first received commercial customers. It is currently estimated that this project can deliver 5.5GWh per annum (electrical equivalence) of new […]

Located to the south-east of Nottingham, Severn Trent Water’s Cropwell Bishop Sewage Treatment Works (STW) serves 700 residential premises in the village and a number of local businesses, including the Cropwell Bishop creamery, which contributes a significant phosphorous loading to the catchment. It also receives pumped sewage flows from the adjacent village of Cropwell Butler. […]

Davyhulme Wastewater Treatment Works (WwTW) is United Utilities (UU) largest, serving over 1.3 million customers across Greater Manchester. Built in 1894, it has seen continuous development in wastewater treatment including the invention of the activated sludge process (ASP) by Ardern & Lockett in 1914. Incoming flows from the combined sewer network can reach 30m3/s, the […]

Earl Shilton Sewage Treatment Works (STW) is situated in south west Leicestershire and serves a population equivalent of 11,833 comprised mainly from domestic sources from Earl Shilton and Barwell. There has been a STW in this location since the 1960s and the current process workstream includes preliminary treatment, primary settlement, secondary filtration, secondary settlement and […]

Goscote STW is an activated sludge process (ASP) works located near Walsall in the West Midlands which serves a population equivalent (PE) of 120,806 (including trade). The site discharges into the River Tame catchment. Its upgrade was key to meet a tighter environmental permit in AMP6, being 10 mg/l BOD, 1.3 mg/l ammonia and 0.2 […]

Ingoldisthorpe WRC was identified by the EA under ‘no deterioration’ as requiring additional measures in order to address the tightening of ammonia and phosphorus levels (1mg/l NH3-N and 4.5mg/l P) in order to sufficiently treat all required flow, meet discharge consents and maintain the quality of the receiving water bodies. The existing works serves a […]

Since 2010 the Risk Management Authorities (RMAs) for the Tyneside Drainage Catchment have developed and implemented an area-based prioritisation process to identify and investigate those drainage areas at greatest risk of performance failure. The Killingworth, Longbenton and Forest Hall area was one of those areas identified, something supported by the published 2010 Strategic Flood Risk […]

Loch Ness Regional is a new multi-site £22m water treatment works and infrastructure project for Scottish Water improving the water supply to their customers from the villages of Fort Augustus and Invermoriston, both to the south of Inverness. Located on the banks of Loch Ness, the project’s objective is to improve the treatment of water […]

The Mythe Water Treatment Works is situated on the east bank of the River Severn, approximately half a mile north of the town of Tewkesbury in Gloucestershire and provides drinking water to population of circa 400,000. Mythe WTW came to national attention in July 2007 when the site was partially inundated with flood water from […]

Otterbourne WSW is a critical site, located between Southampton and Winchester, supplying water to the surrounding area to a total of around 250,000 homes. Otterbourne was originally constructed in 1939, with extensions to the works being constructed in 1949 and 1958. The works treats borehole and river water which supply two independent treatment streams. The […]

Scottish Water’s £17m Paisley Environmental Project, which started in October 2016, is the largest of its kind that Scottish Water has ever made in Renfrewshire. The project is part of the company’s £250m, six-year programme of work, launched in 2013, to improve river water quality and the natural environment and tackle flooding across the Greater […]

Pegswood Sewage Treatment Works (STW) is a Northumbrian Water (NW) site located 16 miles north of Newcastle-upon-Tyne and 2 miles north-east of Morpeth, Northumberland. The treatment process comprised inlet screens, flow control and storm separation to storm tanks, two Dortmund pyramidal settlement tanks, four biological percolating filters, with a circular humus tank discharging final effluent […]

Seaham Sewage Treatment Works (STW) receives and treats raw sewage from Seaham and the surrounding area. Constructed in phases between 1996 and 2001, the works serve a population of over 23,000 people. The works were originally built to ensure compliance with the Bathing Water Directive, as the site discharges directly into the North Sea via […]

Stocksbridge WwTW is located in the village of Deepcar on the outskirts of Stocksbridge, approximately 7km northwest of Sheffield city centre. It currently serves a population of 13,000, but this is expected to grow towards 15,000 by 2030. Major housing development is ongoing near the existing works, and as part of this Yorkshire Water reached […]

Southern Water has started the second phase of its major upgrade of the 100-year-old sewer network across Thanet, Kent. Representing an investment of circa £100m over AMPs 5, 6 and 7, the upgrade aims to maintain the integrity of the sewers, reduce the risk of flooding and protect the environment and chalk aquifer that spans […]

The Hammersmith Pumping Station is one of Thames Water’s key sewerage assets in West London. Its catchment covers an area of around 19 square miles, receiving flows from 47 combined sewer overflows (CSOs). The pumping station discharges 51 times in a typical year releasing 2,210,000m3 of untreated sewage and an estimated 557 tonnes of sewage […]

Situated in Staffordshire, close to the Derbyshire border, Uttoxeter STW serves a mainly domestic population from the town itself. Following catchment modelling, it was determined that there will be significant growth in the population, reaching 24,498 population equivalent in 2035. This increased population would mean that the existing inlet works would not have sufficient capacity […]

Walsall Wood Sewage Treatment Works was a trickling filter site discharging into the Ford Brook, part of the River Tame catchment. Under the new Water Framework Directive, the site was required to comply with stringent new standards for phosphorus and ammonia levels in wastewater (BOD: 10 mg/l, NH3: 1.9 mg/l, Total P: 0.5 mg/l). The […]

Ashford Wastewater Treatment Works is located in Kent alongside the M20 motorway, near the River Great Stour to the South of the Kent Downs (Area of Natural Beauty). The Town of Ashford has a population of approximately 110,000 people. The WwTW serves Ashford and surrounding areas and is supplied by five local pumping stations taking […]

Following on from the Blackburn and Darwen WwTWs (2017) article, the site at Samlesbury, Blackburn, has been prepared for the construction of the 72,000m3 structure which will house the innovative Nereda® aerobic granular biomass technology. The Nereda® system will treat crude sewage that has only received preliminary treatment and has been developed to treat the […]

The Birmingham Resilience Project aims to deliver a new water supply into Birmingham to allow extended planned maintenance shutdowns of the Elan Valley Aqueduct (EVA) as well as providing a back-up for any emergency events. The new supply will be brought into use every other year, for up to 50 days during months of October […]

Since the beginning of the 20th century, the Elan Valley Aqueduct (EVA) has conveyed raw water 118km from the Elan Valley in Wales under gravity to Frankley Water Treatment Works (WTW) in Birmingham. The treatment works was inaugurated at the same time as the EVA and has treated water, to supply the residents and industries […]

As of May 2017 there are 137 designated shellfish protected waters in England and of these, 25 are located within the South West Water region. It is estimated that the industry associated with shellfish production areas in the South West is worth £5.35m per annum (figure from EA based upon Shellfish Association of Great Britain […]

The town of Lytham St. Anne’s and its shoreline is a popular national and regional tourist destination and is linked to many attractions, modern and historic, including St. Anne’s Pier, Lytham Green, Royal Lytham Golf Club, Pleasure Island and Fairhaven Lake. The project is located near Lytham St. Anne’s in the Fylde borough of Lancashire, […]

Great Dunmow Water Recycling Centre (WRC) is located a few kilometres to the east of Stansted Airport in Essex and serves a population of approximately 10,000 people. Due to ongoing capacity limitations and operational issues in the existing works, Anglian Water elected to construct a new treatment plant on the site to serve the current […]

Hayle STW is located at the end of the Hayle estuary in West Cornwall approximately 7 miles east of Penzance.The area immediately surrounding Hayle STW has a small population made up of St. Erth Village. The site itself is located within a large plot bordered to the north by the West Coast Main Line, and […]

Highworth Wastewater Treatment Works (WwTW) is located at Pentylands Lane, Highworth to the northeast of Swindon. The treatment works currently serves a population of approximately 10,000 customers, with an average daily flow of 1,720m3 per day and a peak flow of 55 l/s. The works is Royal HaskoningDHV’s first full-scale Nereda plant in the UK. […]

Yorkshire Water’s Irton Water Treatment Works (WTW) is located 5.5km southwest of Scarborough in North Yorkshire. The WTW abstracts water from an aquifer via numerous boreholes and supplies two local service reservoirs; Springhill and Low Mount, which feed Scarborough and the surrounding area. Demand profiles are seasonably variable. The site has an abstraction licence for […]

Since 2010, the Risk Management Authorities (RMAs) for the Tyneside drainage catchment have developed and implemented an area-based prioritisation process to identify and investigate those drainage areas at greatest risk of performance failure. The Killingworth, Longbenton and Forest Hall area was one of those areas identified, something supported by the published 2010 Strategic Flood Risk […]

Llanfaethlu Wastewater Treatment Works (WwTW) is situated to the north east of the village in Anglesey, North Wales and is owned and operated by Welsh Water. Constructed in the 1960s as a conventional gravitational treatment works, the process utilises primary settlement, stone media trickling filter and humus settlement discharging to a grass plot, together with […]

The Lochaline Water Quality Upgrade Project required the design and delivery of a whole new water treatment works at Lochaline in the remote Morven Peninsula. A modern and compact membrane based treatment technology was selected which would support a rapid and efficient delivery strategy. The key to the delivery strategy was an on off-site modular […]

Melbourne WTW is the second largest clean water treatment works in Severn Trent Water (STW) and serves large population centres in south Derbyshire and Leicestershire with capability to supply up to a maximum of 250Ml/d. The dissolved air flotation (DAF) process removes suspended solids and other contaminants via the use of air bubble flotation. The […]

Minworth STW is Severn Trent’s largest sewage treatment works and serves a population equivalent of 1.75 million from Birmingham with full flow to treatment of 1,070Ml/d. The works treats sludge arising from a population equivalent of 2.3 million which is made up of indigenous sludge plus imported sludge from the nearby Coleshill STW and various […]

The Nine Elms redevelopment area within Battersea includes 21,000 new dwellings, office, leisure and retail space creating 8000 new jobs including the new US Embassy, a relocated New Covent Garden Market site and the Northern Line extension. An integrated water management study completed by Thames Water (TW) in partnership with the Greater London Authority, ARUP […]

In August 2010, Severn Trent commissioned its energy crop anaerobic digestion plant at Stoke Bardolph, Nottingham. It was built to help power the nearby sewage treatment works using crops grown on contaminated farmland which is not suitable for food production. The energy crop plant was sized to convert 37,000 tonnes of maize silage each year […]

Thames Tideway Tunnel is the largest water infrastructure project currently under construction in the UK and will modernise London’s major sewerage system, the backbone of which dates back to Victorian times. Although the sewers built in the mid-19th century are still in excellent structural condition, their hydraulic capacity was designed by Sir Joseph Bazalgette for […]

Tynywaun Water Treatment Works forms part of the South East Wales Conjunctive Use System (SEWCUS) chain of water treatment works that supply the central South Wales valleys and cities of Newport and Cardiff. This SEWCUS system does not, however, provide full conjunctive use to the Tynywaun distribution area, having very limited connectivity. The works has […]

Whittle Dene Water Treatment Works is Northumbrian Water’s fourth largest treatment works with a deployable output of 118Ml/d, supplying 228,000 properties. Located in Northumberland, 13 miles west of Newcastle, it is a strategically important works to Newcastle, Gateshead, North Tyneside, South Northumberland and Tyne Valley regions. Raw water at the site comes from adjacent reservoirs […]

Allonby Wastewater Treatment Works (WwTW) is located to the north of the coastal town of Allonby, Cumbria, serving a population equivalent of less than 1000 within a dominantly rural catchment area. The works provides treatment via a three stage process, including rotating biological contactors (RBCs) and ultraviolet dosing. Allonby WwTW is situated on the coast […]

Wessex Water’s Bristol STW is the largest sewage treatment works within south west region, serving approximately a catchment of 1.1 million people. The works also accounts for more than 50% of region’s sludge treatment. It treats around 100 tonnes dry solid (TDS) per day of indigenous sludge as well as imported sludge to a compliant […]

Davyhulme WwTW is United Utilities’ largest wastewater treatment works, which serves over one million people in Greater Manchester; it has been undergoing a £200 million modernisation process, which started on site in 2015 and is now close to construction completion. The upgrade is required to ensure it complies with tighter discharge consents and the impact […]

Portsmouth Water’s Farlington WTW dates back to 1909 and provides potable water to more than 280,000 people and many businesses in the Portsmouth and Havant area. Farlington’s supply is derived from the springs, which are believed to be the largest spring source in Europe. In April 2015 Portsmouth Water issued a tender based on an […]

Heigham Water Treatment Works (WTW) is the main supply of water to Norwich and supplies an average of 42Ml/d of water sourced from the River Wensum at several locations. Potable water is pumped into the Norwich Public Water Supply Zone feeding a multitude of storage reservoirs, booster pumps and properties. The main raw water abstraction […]

Minworth STW is Severn Trent Water’s largest sewage treatment works and serves a population equivalent of 1.75 million from Birmingham with full flow to treatment of 1,070Ml/d. The works treats sludge arising from a population equivalent of 2.3 million which is made up of indigenous sludge plus imported sludge from the nearby Coleshill STW and […]

Retford STW is located to the north of the town of Retford, Nottinghamshire. It serves a population of approximately 26,000. The project was to address capital maintenance works which includes the replacement/refurbishment of expired life items and the addressing of operational risks. The inlet works screens were capturing approximately 15% rags which was creating a […]

Dŵr Cymru Welsh Water (DCWW) is investing in technologies to generate electricity on its sites in order to reduce their carbon footprint and the amount of imported energy. DCWW has already implemented technologies including solar photovoltaic panels, hydro turbines and gas-to-grid; however the new wind turbine at Swansea is their first wind generation site. Swansea […]

Northumbrian Water Group (NWG) provides water services to 1.5 million customers across a large part of Essex and east London, where it operates as Essex and Suffolk Water. As a vital part of Northumbrian Water’s treated water network, demand up to 55Ml/d is pumped from the Langham WTW on the Essex/Suffolk borders and forward boosted […]

Tynywaun WTW is located at the north end of the Rhondda Fawr Valley, at the base of the Rhigos Mountain, in the village of Tynewydd at an elevation of 1,000 feet. Water treatment works have operated at the Tynywaun site since 1906 and the existing works was last refurbished during the 1990s, with new filters […]

Anchorsholme Park is located on the coast 4 miles north of Blackpool Tower. The storage project is the first of two phases contributing to improving bathing waters on the Fylde coast. The objective of the initial phase is to complete the AMP5 obligations on the Fylde Coast of the “moving towards three spills per bathing […]

In May 2015 Thames Water Operations identified emergency works on Activated Sludge Plant (ASP) 2 at Beckton STW in east London. The work was necessary to address the asset health and resilience of the treatment works, meet performance commitments and ensure satisfactory sludge disposal. The project was a fast track design and implementation with early […]

Frankley WTW is located to the south west of Birmingham city centre. It is the primary water treatment works supplying potable water to the city of Birmingham. The Elan Valley Aqueduct (EVA) is a 118km gravity aqueduct that conveys raw water from the Elan Reservoirs in mid Wales to Frankley WTW. The Elan Reservoirs are […]

Countess Wear STW is located to the south east of the city of Exeter in Devon. Located on the edge of a large residential area, the works is bounded by the River Exe to the east and the Exeter Ship Canal to the west. Countess Wear is best known for the locations of the Countess […]

Located in the North West of England, Davyhulme wastewater treatment works (WwTW) is United Utilities largest works, serving over 1 million customers across Greater Manchester. The works are currently facing several future challenges, namely (i) the tightening of the ammonia (NH3) permit limit from 3mg/l to 1mg/l to comply with the requirements of the Freshwater […]

Elmvale Row is located in the Springburn area in the North of Glasgow City and is comprised of three and four storey residential tenement buildings and residential parking. Land use in the surrounding area includes commercial, residential, parkland and a primary school. The topography of the area and capacity of the existing sewer system has […]

Portsmouth Water’s Farlington WTW dates back to 1909 and provides potable water to more than 280,000 people and many businesses in the Portsmouth and Havant area. Farlington’s supply is derived from the springs, which are believed to be the largest spring source in Europe. Raw water is chlorinated at the spring source pumping stations. At […]

Grafham WTW is located near Huntingdon and serves a population of 829,000, including Northampton, Huntingdon and Bedford. It is estimated that approximately 614,000 of these would be affected by a major outage at Grafham WTW. As part of Anglian Water’s AMP5 Final Business Plan programme, the Grafham WTW Resilience scheme was identified to mitigate the […]

South West Water (SWW) has started construction on a new £60m state-of-the-art water treatment works in Devon, the company’s flagship project in its 2015-2020 business plan. Mayflower WTW will use cutting-edge treatment processes, designed and developed by leading Dutch water technology company PWNT and will serve around 250,000 customers in Plymouth and the surrounding area. […]

United Utilities’ Oswestry WTW is located near to the market town of Oswestry, Shropshire on the England/Wales border. The original works became operational in 1892, near the end of the Victorian era, in response to the growing need for wholesome clean drinking water to Liverpool. It is a large works which treats raw water from […]

Severn Trent Water’s (STW) Sotshole Sewage Pumping Station is situated between the village of Heage and the town of Belper, Derbyshire. The existing pumping station serves approximately 330 individuals from the surrounding residential area and is comprised of a wet and dry well topped by a brick superstructure. The emergency overflow chamber is located within […]