- Public sector entering ‘wild west’ as UK hits peak GDPR frenzy, says ST2 Technology
- Smart Cities: Vehicle routing and its contribution to a 'smart' environment with the help of asset finance
- Are consumers’ opinions of hybrid vehicles changing?
- ABM Critical Solutions completes emergency clean for London college
- UK public sector procurement: current state of play
PSS AWARDS WINNER: Best Water Management Project – Aspire Defence Services Limited
Introduction
Aspire Defence Services Limited (ADSL) manages the Total Facilities Management element of Project Allenby/Connaught (PAC), a 35 year contract and the largest infrastructure PFI ever let by the Ministry of Defence (MOD) covering four Army garrisons on Salisbury Plain and in Aldershot.
Water conservation on the MOD estate is a pressing concern. Developments in the MOD estate put a strain on infrastructure designed for much smaller local populations. In line with Government Greening Commitments and their own over-arching goals to minimise the impacts of defence activities, the Defence Infrastructure Organisation (DIO) and the MOD took positive action to improve efficiencies in water usage and water conservation across the estate.
In addition, the DIO had an urgent requirement to address water efficiency issues within the Larkhill and Bulford Garrisons and Fargo satellite site, in part to support planning applications for Army Basing Programme (ABP) proposed works and to address the concerns of The Environment Agency (EA) with regard to further abstraction of water from ground sources in the area.
As a result, in 2015 ADSL were requested to undertake a Water Wastage Efficiency report for each of these sites to identify how water could be saved.
Communication
Throughout the project the DIO and ADSL management team were updated weekly on progress and results. These results were shared with the Garrison ADSL teams and the MOD’s Safety, Health, Environment and Fire representatives for distribution to the wider base population. Where instant actions were delivered during the surveys, labels were added to appliances to ensure occupants understood what had been altered and why, to help them understand how these changes will help save water.
In addition ADSL’s Energy Team supported the DIO Area Utility Manager’s Energy Awareness Roadshow events across the garrisons to help improve awareness and show base personnel how they can help save energy and water where they live and work. The results from the Water Efficiency programme formed a key element of ADSL’s engagement and awareness material, with key water saving findings and recommendations incorporated into posters and booklets for distribution to MOD personnel. An example of this material is attached to this submission and was used to give guidance on good energy management practices.
Cost Effectiveness
As part of the proposed planning consent for ABP across Salisbury Plain there was an urgent requirement for the DIO to reduce the water consumption, in particular water wastage and leakage, across Larkhill and Bulford Garrisons. The results of this Water Wastage Efficiency programme delivered the savings needed to meet this requirement. In addition the DIO and MOD take water conservation very seriously and this project has helped them achieve significant inroads into reducing their water wastage at these sites and highlighted opportunities for improvements at other locations.
‘ADSL have given an innovative, fresh approach to water saving on the estate and delivered real value to the MOD. This project demonstrates our underlying commitment to water conservation and the environment and we are now looking at extending this project to other viable sites’ Keith Westlake, Project Allenby Connaught M&E services, DIO.
Following completion of all the detailed survey and investigation work, the final report provided a summary analysis and evaluation of the findings, which includes the amount of water saved, and recommendations for further water efficiencies. The success of this programme, lessons learned and the excellent results it delivered has helped demonstrate the opportunity that exists to improve water conservation and efficiency at other sites within the MOD estate.
Partnerships
The Energy Analysts and Energy Monitoring Technicians at ADSL worked together for 5 months to complete these detailed surveys, implement actions and report on project progress for the 495 buildings. During and after the surveys, the Garrison Maintenance Teams were also involved in delivering more complex measures to further reduce waste water usage across the sites.
The survey programme was designed to be as flexible as possible and regular liaison with MOD building managers helped to ensure disruption to occupants was kept to a minimum.
Innovation and Product Selection/Diversity
During 2015 an innovative programme was undertaken to survey 495 buildings across Larkhill, Bulford and Fargo, with the aim of identifying and reducing water wastage. Each building survey included the following key stages:
- Understanding the Current State a. Detailed visual inspections, monitoring and survey of all water consuming appliances, such as toilets, showers and urinals and investigating how they were currently operating. b. Identification of current water metering and installation of temporary water sub-metering, to identify where water is being used in the building. This included using specialist leak detection equipment to trace suspected major water leaks. c. Analysis of current water usage and wastage from the identified appliances.
- Water Wastage Improvement a. Identification of water saving opportunities and pinpointing equipment which required fixing. This included making recommendations for the installation of water saving devices. b. Delivering ‘Instant Actions’ where possible – any simple measures that delivered immediate water savings, with negligible impact on building users, were implemented during the surveys. This included actions such as adjusting appliance water flow rates. c. More complex requirements were recorded and sent to the Garrison Maintenance Teams for resolution, through our ADSL ‘Help Desk’ system. This system allows requests to be logged and tracked through to completion.
Carbon Reduction Commitment
The overall outcome of the water efficiency drive resulted in a total of 495 buildings surveyed and 250 help desk requests to address the identified issues. The surveys identified minimum savings of at least 70,400 m3 of water per year. This water saving is equivalent to over 880,000 baths or 1.5M showers.
This is a very significant water saving and will help further improve the MOD’s water efficiency and conservation credentials and ensure the local environment and communities are safeguarded. In addition, raising awareness and sharing best practice amongst MOD personnel across all the sites in PAC will further help drive down water usage.