Mill Fleam Pumping Station
With our colleagues at JBA Bentley leading on the design and build of this award-winning project, we provided environmental expertise to support the installation of new flood defences and ensure the ecological sensitivity of the area was considered at all times.
Located within a city centre public park, this project posed a number of unique challenges. Due to limited space, tight deadlines and precious fauna and flora to consider, innovation, collaboration and sustainability were key to the successful delivery of improved flood defences for Derby city centre.
- Client Derby City Council
- Location Derby
- Partners JBA Bentley
- Services
An award-winning design and build solution, underpinned by innovation and environmental expertise to protect precious fauna and flora
Having suffered historic river and surface water flooding, Mill Fleam Pumping Station forms a key part of Derby's new flood defence network, which provides increased protection to shops, businesses, and residential properties in the city centre.
However, due to the city centre location of the new pumping station, the proposed solution had to consider a variety of environmental and ecological sensitivities. As a result, as well as the installation of two hydraulic lock gates, sheet piled river walls and the new pumping station, the works also included the creation of a fish refuge area and re-landscaping to improve bird and bat habitats.
This required close collaboration across JBA Bentley and JBA Consulting with our team's providing expertise on planning and development, landscape and arboriculture and ecology, in order to minimise the environmental impact of the works.
Achieving this required the adoption of new ways of working and innovations to protect the site's precious fauna and flora. This included planning works with a licensed bat worker and changing pile installation methods to minimise noise and vibration. During in-channel construction works a 'bubble curtain' was also utilised to mitigate silt disturbance and manage fish passage.
Mill Fleam Pumping Station was named Environmental Project of the Year at the British Construction Industry Awards 2023.
Delivering environmental enhancements
Due to its location within a wooded public park, providing environmental enhancement was a key objective in the development of Mill Fleam Pumping Station. The work to achieve this included re-landscaping the surrounding parkland, with existing trees, vegetation and access pathways being improved or replaced. More than 75 new trees were also established to improve habitats for bats and birds. As part of the installation of the new pumping station, we also created a fish refuge area, which will provide shelter for aquatic life in low and high flows.
Cutting carbon at every opportunity
As this project had the potential to generate significant embodied and operational carbon, carbon reduction formed a key part of the design and build. By using carbon modelling tools to assess the real-time impact of design changes and identify carbon hotspots, 100T/CO2e was removed from the solution delivered. This included using high efficiency pumps and variable speed drives to minimise power demands, as well as manufacturing pile caps, cladding panels and access stairs for the works off-site using 3D concrete printing technology.
To further cut emissions all site plant and equipment utilised Hydrogenated Vegetable Oil (HVO) in place of traditional gas oil, which reduced site plant CO2 emissions by around 90%.
