Fairlie's new Water Treatment Plant has had some input from a Civil Engineering student.
The existing Water Treatment Plant for Fairlie does not meet the New Zealand Drinking Water Standards. Its current E Grade rating is an unacceptable risk to the approximately 1000 residents in and near Fairlie.
One of our Civil Engineering students developed a design for replacement infrastructure, to bring the Water Treatment Plant up to a C Grade. He consulted with Mackenzie District Council to find out their specifications, including their capital works budget for the upgrade and the need for low operating and maintenance costs for such a small system. They wanted a UV disinfection system, and they wanted to stay within the constraints of the resource consents they already had, or had applied for, for taking water from one of two possible sources.
The student did a site visit and familiarised himself with the resource consents and the Drinking Water Standards requirements for treatment of water from a pastoral catchment. The next step was to design the treatment process, including checks. Then he designed the system and associated infrastructure, preparing preliminary construction drawings. He identified the best source of water to use, selected a site, and integrated the existing chlorine treatment shed. He used modelling to test his design, to ensure it would meet the required specifications for water treatment.
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