New treatment plant fires up and goes to pot

TECHNOLOGY UPDATE

A new, Scottish Water water treatment works, built using low-emission methods, has started supplying water using ceramic membrane filters.

Ceramic filters have a greater surface area than conventional filters making them more efficient but they are significantly more expensive with the capital costs some 20% greater than for an equivalent-sized polymer filter plant. This has restricted the uptake of ceramic filters.

However, ceramic filters show much greater resilience than polymer filters to chemicals, pressure, heat and other challenges leading to a longer lifetime – 15 years compared to about seven years – which offsets the greater cost.

The water company said the £30m treatment plant was built using low-carbon construction techniques which included delivering the works in 36t sections after being built offsite some 300km away. Principle contractor on the build, Ross-shire Engineering, said building it in this way, “dramatically cut the amount of construction carbon, the amount of time spent on the site and the number of deliveries required, all of which helped reduce the impact on the community.”

The site will generate power for the treatment plant from 288 solar panels.