The proof is in
the water
Protecting environmental capital with the science of water monitoring
Mote at Whenuapai Village.
Phathom’s technology is helping to safeguard the environment on one of Auckland’s next-generation residential developments: Whenuapai Village, a 41 hectare residential Special Housing Area north of Auckland. Sediment controls are vital on such a site, especially in the rainy season when topsoil washes off.
Mote, the company that’s installed the Phathom sensor at Whenuapai, are leaders in environmental monitoring technology. Part-owned by the commercialisation arm of the University of Auckland, they provide precision measurement data within digital information and IoT supply chains. Mote installed Phathom’s S40-SWW sensor at Whenuapai because they trust its accuracy and reliability to help protect the site’s environmental capital. “It measures TSS reliably, we get a very linear calibration curve for a wide range of TSS values,” says Senior Scientist Morkel Zaayman.
Project overview
- 41 hectare residential development
- Over 300,000 m3 of earthworks
- 7km of roads and 15km of kerbing
- 20,000m² of footpaths and vehicle crossings
- Over 20km of stormwater and sewer drainage lines plus a 10m deep wastewater pump station
- Over 30km of trenching, ducting, and backfilling for services
- Extensive planting, landscaping, and creation of wetlands
A tough sensor for a
super-sized project
Highway Electrical on Watercare’s Central Interceptor
Phathom sensors are being used in the depths of construction of New Zealand’s longest wastewater tunnel: Watercare’s Central Interceptor, “a super-sized wastewater tunnel” designed to prevent wastewater overflows into Auckland’s beautiful harbours, which has been a problem for decades. The completed tunnel will be 14.7 kilometres long at depths of up to 110 metres below ground. Phathom’s T30-SWW has been installed to help manage sediment on the tunnel construction site.
Highway Electrical are the industrial maintenance experts who installed the Phathom sensor. Project Manager Kevin McGarvey says they chose Phathom because the sensor is robust. Before they used Phathom, they’d tried using another TSS and turbidity meter on a different project, but that single-beam sensor couldn’t do the job. “Mechanically it wouldn’t handle the situation, it blew out of the pipework because it couldn’t handle the pressure and debris. This technology has come from the laboratory and into the real world where it has to withstand construction site applications,” says McGarvey. So Highway Electrical quickly switched to Phathom and they haven’t gone back.
“It’s tough.”
Kevin McGarvey, Highway Electrical
Project overview
- Tunnel length: 14.7km
- Diameter: 4.5m
- Depth: 15-110m underground
- Capacity: 200,000m3, equivalent to 80 Olympic-sized swimming pools
- Commencement: 2019
- Completion: 2025
- Network: Auckland has 8,000 kilometres of public wastewater pipes
- “The largest project in Watercare’s history”