Driving down carbon emissions and improving drought resilience in Scotland

The C1a project consists of installation of seven miles of pipeline and a pumping station for Scottish Water, to improve drought resilience of the water mains network, connect the Glasgow and Ayrshire systems and protect supplies for about one million customers.

CWA’s Head of Technical Services, Steve McCulloch said, “CWA are working closely with a sustainability consultant from AECOM who is providing advice around carbon savings. Together we’re developing a tool that will allow us to select pipe that has the biggest carbon benefit. It is our intention to roll this new tool out across the capital investment programme.

We are also using digital design initiatives such as the use of 3D surveys on the C1a project, which reduces the need for site visits by using real-time syncing of data to the GIS platform. The project will also make use of a 360-degree interactive online virtual consultation platform to share project information with stakeholders which avoids the need to travel to site, reducing our carbon footprint."

So far, the use of special restraint joints has removed an estimated 5,500m³ of concrete thrust blocks, which has reduced embodied carbon by approximately 16, 000 tons; 15,000 from concrete and 1000 from transporting it. Solar panels offset the power demands at the project’s new pumping station, with the new trunk mains utilizing increased gravity capacity to further reduce operational power consumption by 60 per cent. The site cabins for the project have a number of energy saving features including high levels of insulation and PIR sensors to operate LED lighting. As a result of introducing these low carbon cabins, our client, Scottish Water have specified them as a requirement on new frameworks.

The work we are doing at CWA is part of our legacy to Scotland and future generations.