Electric valve actuators for water treatment plant

Edited by the Engineeringtalk editorial team Dec 5, 2001

Rotork electric valve actuators have been installed throughout a new water treatment plant in Essex designed to meet increased user demand with improved filtration efficiency.

Rotork electric valve actuators have been installed throughout a new water treatment plant designed to meet increased user demand with improved filtration efficiency.

Ardleigh Reservoir in Essex serves a large part of the Tendring Peninsula for Tendring Hundred Water Services and part of the town of Colchester for the Anglian Water Group.

Modernisation and expansion of the treatment works has included the construction of a new rapid gravity sand filtration plant and the conversion of the existing multi-media filtration plant to granulated activated carbon (GAC) contactors for improved taste and odour treatment.

On completion, the enlarged plant's designed treatment capacity will increase by more than 30% to 40 megalitres per day (MLD).

Flow through the new plant is controlled by over 90 Rotork IQ and AQ electric valve actuators, mainly operating Erhard butterfly valves.

A new stand-alone Allen Bradley distributed control system (DCS) has been installed on site to automatically supervise the actuators and other plant equipment over an Ethernet link, utilising an InTouch SCADA software programme designed by the main contractor.

Rotork was specified for the improvement project as a result of the reservoir company's experience with the Rotork actuators already installed in other plant areas.

Ardleigh Reservoir's Works Manager Mike Suffling explains: "Rotork valve actuators have been giving us reliable service for many years.

We therefore wanted to continue using products with which we are familiar and which we know we can rely on.

"In addition to the new filtration plant, Rotork actuators have also been installed on an associated upgrade project to bring our dissolved air flotation plant into the same automation scheme." The work at Ardleigh Reservoir is being performed by design and build contractors JBS Construction Ltd.