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What is a reservoir?
Reservoirs are essentially human-made lakes that can be used to store water during wetter months, so this can be turned into drinking water during drier months. This helps ensure a more resilient and sustainable water supply.
To build the reservoir, we’ll excavate soil and underlying material from the site and use this to create three raised embankments that will, along with the natural topography, contain the water. These embankments will be built to strict national standards and will be subject to regular independent monitoring by national experts.
Then, we’ll also need to be able to transport water from our sources to the reservoir; and when required, back out to the homes, businesses and essential services that will use it.
What do we need to build?
To do all this, we will need to build and consider the following:
Abstraction locations and pumping stations ‘Abstraction’ is when you take water from a natural source like a river, which in England requires a licence from the Environment Agency. We’re looking at different locations where we could abstract water, including from West Stourmouth (on the Little Stour), and either from Plucks Gutter (on the Great Stour) or an area North of West Stourmouth also on the Great Stour. Each abstraction point will need a pumping station to get the water from the river, and one site will need a treatment plant to remove sediment before the water reaches the reservoir.
The reservoir and its embankments Our proposed site for the reservoir already sits within an existing ‘U’ shape in the valley, which can help us to safely store water. But, we’ll still need to build a new embankment to the east and create two smaller, additional embankments, to protect the local woodland from flooding. This will allow us to create a reservoir which will be an area of approximately 84 hectares, which is equivalent to 118 football pitches. The reservoir will have an estimated capacity of 5,126 million litres of water, which is 29.3 million standard baths.
Raw water pipelines Underground pipelines will be used to transport the water from the abstraction locations to the reservoir. There will be valves we can open and close at different stages, but gravity will keep the water flowing, so we won’t need any extra pumping stations along the route.
Water treatment works A new water treatment works will be located to the east of the reservoir, close to the main embankment and will process the water into clean, safe drinking water, meeting all necessary Drinking Water Inspectorate (DWI) standards. The water will be carefully tested as it moves through each stage of the process.
Potable (drinking) water pipeline Once treated and tested, the drinking water will be transported from the water treatment works to our Blean Service Reservoir, through a 7.5 km underground pipeline. From our Blean Service Reservoir, the water will then be supplied through our network, to homes and businesses across the Canterbury region.
The diagram below shows how we will abstract, store, treat and supply water to homes and businesses from Broad Oak Water:
What is a reservoir?
Reservoirs are essentially human-made lakes that can be used to store water during wetter months, so this can be turned into drinking water during drier months. This helps ensure a more resilient and sustainable water supply.
To build the reservoir, we’ll excavate soil and underlying material from the site and use this to create three raised embankments that will, along with the natural topography, contain the water. These embankments will be built to strict national standards and will be subject to regular independent monitoring by national experts.
Then, we’ll also need to be able to transport water from our sources to the reservoir; and when required, back out to the homes, businesses and essential services that will use it.
What do we need to build?
To do all this, we will need to build and consider the following:
Abstraction locations and pumping stations ‘Abstraction’ is when you take water from a natural source like a river, which in England requires a licence from the Environment Agency. We’re looking at different locations where we could abstract water, including from West Stourmouth (on the Little Stour), and either from Plucks Gutter (on the Great Stour) or an area North of West Stourmouth also on the Great Stour. Each abstraction point will need a pumping station to get the water from the river, and one site will need a treatment plant to remove sediment before the water reaches the reservoir.
The reservoir and its embankments Our proposed site for the reservoir already sits within an existing ‘U’ shape in the valley, which can help us to safely store water. But, we’ll still need to build a new embankment to the east and create two smaller, additional embankments, to protect the local woodland from flooding. This will allow us to create a reservoir which will be an area of approximately 84 hectares, which is equivalent to 118 football pitches. The reservoir will have an estimated capacity of 5,126 million litres of water, which is 29.3 million standard baths.
Raw water pipelines Underground pipelines will be used to transport the water from the abstraction locations to the reservoir. There will be valves we can open and close at different stages, but gravity will keep the water flowing, so we won’t need any extra pumping stations along the route.
Water treatment works A new water treatment works will be located to the east of the reservoir, close to the main embankment and will process the water into clean, safe drinking water, meeting all necessary Drinking Water Inspectorate (DWI) standards. The water will be carefully tested as it moves through each stage of the process.
Potable (drinking) water pipeline Once treated and tested, the drinking water will be transported from the water treatment works to our Blean Service Reservoir, through a 7.5 km underground pipeline. From our Blean Service Reservoir, the water will then be supplied through our network, to homes and businesses across the Canterbury region.
The diagram below shows how we will abstract, store, treat and supply water to homes and businesses from Broad Oak Water:
