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Summary: This talk will be about interesting developments in wind power generation. One of the interesting developments is in floating farms and how they are linked to shore stations.
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The Anglian Water Whitlingham Works is the main effluent water processing plant for the Greater Norwich Area servicing more than 400,000 customer. Its main objective is reduce the amount of hazardous materials in the input effluent to safe levels before returning the flow to the nearby River Yare. The works are designed to be operational even under extreme conditions. The most important extreme conditions are prolonged heavy rainstorms. Because of the predicted increase of such events due to global warming Whitlingham is currently undergoing a significant upgrade.
Given the amount of work that is taking place at the site, the Society is extremely grateful to Anglian Water for arranging a visit for a small group of Members to the plant and providing an expert team of guides led by Stuart Chatten.
Stuart started the tour with a brief history of the plant. He then gave us an overview of how the present plant operated including an outline of the target specifications for the output flows. He informed the group how notional waste products from the cleaning up process could indeed be put to good use. For instance, the methane produced is used, via heat power units, to provide more than enough electrical power to run the whole site; indeed it is regularly pushing power into the National Grid. Another example is that the solid waste can, with very little effort, converted to a compost like material for agricultural use.
Stuart then took the group on a tour of the working site starting with a look at how the inflow is screened for non useful materials such as gravel and cloth like material. The group then looked at the settling beds where the organic solid material suitable for bioprocessing was removed from the effluent. This aterial is used in biodigesters to produce the methane gas used in the heat powerplants. The group was then taken to tanks where microbial action removed the small scale suspended solid materials. The output from this area was then fed into an aerating plant and a final settling plant before the flow was fed back into the Yare.
.About 30 Members and guests visited the very interesting, privately run, Wind Energy Museum near Potter Heigham. We must thank Debra, the owner for an excellently organised and informative event. The museum houses of a range of working machines from the very early devices used to drain the Broads to devices that were constructed in the late fifties to act as bore hole pumps in the drier places in the world such as the Australian bush and the near desserts of the USA. The wind was sufficiently strong on our visit day for Debra to get all the devices working.
One of the effects of the recent pandemic is that Debra has had very little help in the way of volunteers to run the museum; particularly in terms of maintenance and general upkeep. The museum, therefore, is only open to pre-arranged group visits such as the NES but, sadly, not the general public. One very interesting part of the museum she was able to open up and get working for us was the workshop associated with the maintenance of the site. This housed all sorts of machines dating from the 1920s; all of which were driven from a common belt drive that, in its early days, was powered by a source. This workshop was set up by the then museum owner in the early 1950s. One interesting wind power source belonging to the museum collection is the working Wind pump at nearby Thurne Staithe that some Members visited after lunch at the nearby Thurne Lion pub.
During our visit, Debra explained her vision to expand the scope of the museum to include modern developments in wind power. This being particularly important as the coast of East Anglia is the location of several of the UKs offshore wind farms. She is currently involved in discussion with several
local companies working in this area.
Cantley Sugar Works has the last continuously running coal fired power station in the UK. Current legislation states that al such units have to be phased out by Dec 31st 2024. The plant at Cantley ends its life at the end of the Works current sugar production campaign in April. Through the good services of Matt Goodrum, Adam Furby and Andy Cowan of Cantley, a visit to the Works was arranged before the station ceased operation.
The tour started with Andy giving an overview of the Works with Adam explaining in a little more detail about the history of why the works generated its own electricity; basically a by product of the need for vast quantities of steam needed to process the extraction of sugar and electricity needed in subsidiary operations running this process. At the time when major investments were being at Cantley the cheapest form of steam generating energy was by burning coal. At the same time it was decided that some of the steam could be used via a steam turbine to generate electricity. In non sugar producing periods some electricity is exported to the national grid.
The next part of the tour was to be taken by Andy and Matt to visit the boilers and see the generator in operation. The tour concluded with a viewing of the equipment used in the extraction of sugar and see the processes used to make the different grades of sugar.
Many Thanks to Donard and Anne Decogan for volunteering to mount our first Summer Social since the ravages of the recent pandemic. As well as the splendid location, overlooking their beautiful gardens, the weather could not have been better; warm and sunny with a gentle breeze. This meant that the whole event was outdoors which was helpful as a significant numbers of Members and their partners attended.
Council would very much like to thank all the attendees who brought food with them that added to the already splendid spread prepared by our hosts. In particular, Stephen Temple ought to be mentioned bringing along a wide selection of Mrs Temple cheeses that were much appreciated by the Members present.
As with previous Socials, an area was set aside for Members to discuss engineering objects or talk about engineering situations they had been involved in or just fun objects such as Tony Meacock and his 10 sec timing test. It was amazing how far out some Members could be especially those who had been involved in high level football refereeing! Another object of interest was one of the A frame supports that Tim Birt had fabricated to use in the construction of a new building for his daughter.
An enjoyable time was had by all who came. Many Thanks again to the Decogans.