The annual Water New Zealand conference and exhibition was held at the brand new Tākina conference centre in Wellington from October 17th-19th. Any readers who attended will agree that the water sector is an absolutely massive industrial sector, well served by a lot of sophisticated service providers deploying some exciting new technologies.
Sadly, while the sector performs incredibly well most of the time, it’s the high-profile events such as drinking water contamination in Havelock North and Queenstown, multiple network failures in Wellington and the ongoing sewerage spill in Auckland that grab the media attention.
To mangle an idiom somewhat, Entec dipped its toes into the water sector with a double-sized stand in the exhibition hall, and it was a great experience. Entec offers a broad range of products and services to a broad range of sectors. Most applicable to the water sector are our Gas Detection and Prefabricated Plant Room products.
Gas Detection
There are numerous gas hazards within the water sector, and Entec has an excellent range of products to mitigate the risks of toxic and flammable gases. Indeed, we wrote about this very recently in a blog post on our specialist gas detection website.
The need for gas detection equipment arises from risks such as;
- Hydrogen sulphide (H2S) which is commonly found in and around wastewater treatment plants
- Methane (CH4) which is a product of the digestion process used in wastewater treatment plants
- Insufficient quality air for breathing while working in confined spaces (tanks, vessels, underground passages etc)
Entec provides a range of portable (wearable devices, or area monitors) and fixed-point gas detection devices which will detect specific gases. Equally importantly, Entec backs up these products with outstanding after-sale service to ensure the products are correctly used, properly maintained and kept within the manufacturer's calibration range. We also offer a large fleet of rental equipment, which is useful when the headcount on a site fluctuates up and down (e.g. site peaks for maintenance shutdowns).
Of particular interest at the Water NZ exhibition was the Acrulog range of odour loggers. These can be deployed around a site to record gas readings over time (predominantly H2S), providing reliable data to allow for gas and odour emissions to be better managed.
Prefabricated Plant Rooms
Water systems (for all three waters; fresh water, storm water and wastewater) rely on gravity and on electrically driven pumps to move the product around the network. As water networks expand or are rejuvenated and modernised, many more pumps will be deployed, often demanding an increase in the reticulated electricity supply around a site.
Entec’s prefabricated plant rooms are an excellent solution to improve the cost, speed, quality and safety of electrical infrastructure projects. This is achieved by carrying out the majority of equipment installation in a factory environment, off-site and without needing to deploy skilled resources around the countryside.
Of the 35 or so prefabricated plant rooms Entec has built in recent years, three have been specifically used to house the switchboards, variable speed drives and control systems for water pumping stations. Many of these rooms have also been used as substations in power distribution networks, power stations and around industrial sites.
In short, wherever new electrical systems are required, prefabricated plant rooms can play a part in the project.