NI Water has completed a £10m programme of work at Belfast Wastewater Treatment Works. It is the first phase in a continued programme of work at the plant, which will protect the environment, support development and aid economic growth in the city.
The extensive project completed by Murphy Dawson-Wam JV, with McAdam Design providing project management support, saw the construction of two new treatment tanks at the Duncrue Road site – equivalent in volume to six Olympic-size swimming pools – to cope with current and short-term future wastewater requirements.
Mark Brownlee, Senior Project Manager at NI Water, said: “Due to constraints in investment over the past 20 years, many parts of the wastewater and drainage infrastructure serving greater Belfast are now having to operate at or over their original design capacity.
“The two new treatment tanks that have been completed here will provide much-needed additional secondary treatment capacity and augment the existing process to ensure that the discharge to Belfast Lough remains compliant with Northern Ireland Environment Agency standards. The new assets will also facilitate essential improvements within the associated sewerage networks and will enable maintenance works to be undertaken in the other treatment tanks at a future date.
“This significant investment by NI Water will ensure our key wastewater treatment works for Belfast remains compliant, in advance of the next phase of the main ‘Living With Water Programme’ commencing.”
Contained within a site area of around 180,000 square metres (almost 2 million square feet), Belfast WwTW was designed to treat a domestic and trade population equivalent of 290,000. The current works was built in 1991 to replace the original Victorian works which dates back to the early 1900s.
The extended wastewater treatment works will now have the capability of accommodating a population equivalent of almost half a million people.
