Years ago, dam-builders came to develop the vast hydroelectric potential of the remote James Bay region of northern Québec. They called the region barren because it had no agriculture and was sparsely settled by indigenous people who lived off the land. When those people, the Crees, found the dam-builders changing their land without permission, they fought back. They won some court battles but were overwhelmed by the political and economic forces that were driving the big project. Still, the Crees succeeded in getting the governments and companies behind it to agree to meet some of their needs for social and
Researchers working with the National Aeronautics and Science Administration, with the help of twin satellites whose sole purpose was to collect data on the Earth’s water storage, have found dangerous groundwater loss in three northwestern states of India. Image: NASA The pair of GRACE satellites, released into orbit in August 2002, transmitted monthly observation in groundwater changes to the Center for Space Research at the University of Texas at Austin. Photo: NASA After six years of monitoring northwestern India, the GRACE satellite mission revealed a 109 cu-km loss of groundwater supplies. Related Links: Renderings of 231st St. Station Scientists concluded
Contractors building two segments of a 13-mile-long sewage conveyance tunnel near Seattle have devised plans to fix in place two stalled tunnel-boring machines that had been working in poor soils and high groundwater pressure. The tunnel is a key portion of King County, Wash.’s $1.8-billion Brightwater wastewater treatment project. The rims of the cutter heads on the 17.5-ft-dia Herrenknecht slurry machines were damaged, allowing rock and boulders to get stuck, says Gunars Sreiders, King County project manager. The general contractor, the joint venture Vinci/Parsons RCI/Frontier-Kemper, first stopped tunneling in May and laid off about 160 employees. The second machine was
Contractors building two segments of a 13-mile-long sewage conveyance tunnel near Seattle have devised plans to fix in place two stalled tunnel-boring machines that had been working in poor soils and high groundwater pressure. Related Links: Outfall Pipe Floated and Stuck for Washington State Plant Seattle's Brightwater System Moving Toward Construction The tunnel is a key portion of King County, Wash.’s $1.8-billion Brightwater wastewater treatment project. The rims of the cutter heads on the 17.5-ft-dia Herrenknecht slurry machines were damaged, allowing rock and boulders to get stuck, says Gunars Sreibers, King County project manager. The general contractor, the joint venture
An Aug. 13 agreement between state and Federal authorities resolves long-standing issues and promises to remove bureaucratic obstacles to the restoration of the Everglades in South Florida under the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP). The �master agreement� establishes uniform terms and conditions for the project partnership agreements under which the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the South Florida Water Management District will cooperate and share costs for the CERP projects. Photo: South Florida Water Management District Master Agreement will release $65 million for Picayune Strand construction, where canals were plugged and streets demolished a few years ago to restore
The Panama Canal Authority has opened the bidding process for the last of four dry-excavation contracts for the waterway’s third-lane expansion. The dry excavation is needed to create a 6.7-km link between the existing navigational channel at the entrance to the Gaillard Cut, the canal’s narrowest stretch, as well as the new set of locks yet to be constructed. Last month, that $3.1-billion contract was won by an international team of contractors and design firms, Grupo Unidos por el Canal, led by Spanish contractor Sacyr Vallehermoso S.A. The upcoming excavation contract represents more than half the total works needed for
The city of Hamilton, Ontario, is embarking on a $550-million upgrade of its main wastewater-treatment plant. CH2M Hill, with subconsultant AECOM, is performing detailed design and services during construction of the project, which could last five to seven years, says Dan McKinnon, acting director of operations for the Hamilton Dept. of Public Works. The project will replace a 500-megaliter-per-day activated-sludge treatment plant with a 1,000-mld membrane bioreactor, treat a large combined-sewer flow and help to clean up a polluted Lake Ontario harbor. “There is no aspect of the existing wastewater-treatment plant that won’t be touched,” says McKinnon. The planned bioreactor
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is holding a series of meetings this summer in several states to discuss the federal government’s new plan for restoring water quality in the Great Lakes. The $475-million draft plan, proposed in President Barack Obama’s fiscal 2010 budget, needs congressional approval before it can be implemented. But government officials are moving forward with public meetings and say they may issue requests for proposals as early as late summer 2009 for competitive grants for work to begin in early 2010. “Administrator [Lisa] Jackson feels a great sense of urgency for more action to restore the Great
Mobilization has begun in Southern California for excavation of the foundation of what authorities are calling the largest raise of a concrete dam in the U.S. and the largest using roller-compacted concrete in the world. A groundbreaking ceremony on July 9 will kick off the project to raise San Vicente Dam, Lakeside, Calif., in the final phase of the San Diego County Water Authority’s Emergency Storage Project. “It will more than double the capacity of the reservoir,” says Kelly Rodgers, authority project manager. “San Diego relies primarily on imported water.” Water supplies from the Colorado River and from northern California
If finished by 2011 as planned and supported by an effective stormwater pumping system, the $14.3-billion hurricane and storm-damage risk-reduction system of levees, gates and floodwalls going up around New Orleans will “dramatically reduce” vulnerability to flooding and potential loss of lives and property during extreme storms events, according to a new report that explains the extraordinary risk-analysis tools developed to study the system since Hurricane Katrina’s devastation in 2005. “If it’s constructed and performs equal to what we assume it will in the model, it’s going to be a hell of a system,” says Lewis “Ed” Link, the director
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