United Utilities completes printed concrete wastewater chamber pilot

TECHNOLOGY UPDATE

United Utilities and tech firm, ChangeMaker3D, have designed, installed and tested a 3D printed-concrete wastewater chamber at one of the water company’s test facilities in Cheshire.

The partners have claimed 3D printed concrete technology – "Printfrastructure" – provides reductions of: 25% in carbon, 20% in costs and 55% in labour compared with conventional methods.They claimed also that the United Utilities chamber was printed in under four hours with “a significant reduction” in the materials used as well as safety improvements through a reduced requirement to work at height or in confined spaces.

United Utilities’ chief engineer, Lisa Mansell, said: “Through the process, we’ve been able to carry out all the rigorous testing we would want around strength, durability and water tightness. This is important for giving our construction partners comfort around the new technology, because ultimately, we’ll be asking some of them to adopt it.

Other collaborators in the project included: CyBe Construction, Costain, Constructure, Ainscough and AutoMutatio.