Eramosa is pleased to announce that a project we helped bring to fruition has been recognized by the Consulting Engineers of Alberta. The upgrade of the Fort McMurray Water Treatment Plant has won the 2015 Award of Excellence in the Water Resources & Energy Production category.
The upgrade was designed by Associated Engineering and built by Bird Construction. Eramosa’s Calgary office brought its considerable SCADA system programming knowledge to the job as a sub-consultant of Bird. The improvements included the addition of chemical systems, Actiflo pre-treatment, filtration capacity, and a high lift pumping station complete with reservoir.
The project effectively doubled the capacity of the plant while working within the limitations of the site’s small footprint. By adding a new ballasted flocculation system to act in parallel to the plant’s existing processes, the expansion allows Fort McMurray to meet both the current and future water demands of its 60,000 citizens. The new method treats raw water from the Athabasca River with zero waste discharge back into the river.
Eramosa utilized the Municipality’s standardized PLC hardware and control philosophy to install or modify 13 PLCs on the plant network. The team was also responsible for programming the network hardware in the new redundant fiber optic ring network. Profibus DP and PA fieldbus networks were utilized for smart instruments in the field. A GE Proficy iFix and Proficy Historian were also employed so plant operations can visualize plant actions while collecting data from water treatment plant process areas and remote water distribution sites.
“We are elated that Associated Engineering was acknowledged with this award, ” said Adam McCardle, Team Leader of Eramosa’s Calgary office. “Eramosa is proud to be connected to projects where clients are duly recognized for their outstanding work.”
“Since the existing plant had capacity limitations, Eramosa’s commissioning team was constrained to windows of plant down time. This presented many start-up challenges and required additional co-ordination efforts between all stakeholders. In the end though it proved to be a superb project for us as it allowed Eramosa to demonstrate all facets of our team.”
Eramosa is delighted to have had the opportunity to work on this award-winning system within Western Canada and looks forward to continuing its partnership with our associates on future endeavours.
For more information on this project, please contact:
Adam McCardle, P.L. (Eng.), C.E.T.
Eramosa
e. adam.mccardle@eramosa.com
m. 403.650.4137
p. 403.208.7447