Water delivery efficiency with stainless steel

Stainless steel is playing an important role in delivering effective infrastructure to achieve water savings, securing a sustainable environment and future for irrigation communities in Australia.

Murray Irrigation’s Private Irrigation Infrastructure Operator Program (PIIOP) Round 3 in New South Wales is a modernisation project focused on upgrading larger infrastructure within the main canals of its irrigation assets, including Mulwala and Wakool Canals.

Mulwala Canal is Australia’s largest irrigation canal, and together with Wakool Canal runs 157km long. It has the capacity to deliver more than 1,500,000ML of water per year to irrigators in the Southern Riverina, helping to generate more than $500 million of gross agriculture revenue per year for the region.

ASSDA Member AWMA successfully delivered 91 stainless steel water control gates across the project’s irrigation system assets, which has substantially increased water efficiencies, improved water flow, enabled ordering flexibility and significantly reduced water leakage through infrastructure upgrades.

The works included 21 Mulwala Canal Sites (65 LayFlat gates and 26 Undershot gates), Lawson Syphons (two Undershot gates), the Edward River Escape (two Bulkhead gates) and the Wakool Canal Offtake (three Undershot gates).

All water control gates were purposeengineered and manufactured by AWMA to meet exact site and operational requirements. Fabricated from 230 tonnes of grade 304 stainless steel, 6mm sheet, with some components machined from grade 316, material for the project was supplied by ASSDA Member Vulcan Stainless. The stainless steel water control gates required 7.5km of weld, then pickled to improve corrosion resistance and tested in-house to international ISO 9001 quality standards.

Murray Irrigation

AWMA

AWMA

ASSDA Member Arcus Wire Group were also engaged by AWMA to assist in the design and supply of 20mm, 7x19, grade 304 stainless steel wire rope cables for the purposes of raising and lowering the water control gates. 130 cables were supplied (two cables installed per LayFlat gate), with an individual Minimum Breaking Strength (MBS) of over 27,000kgf. Arcus Wire Group and AWMA collaboratively designed the bespoke cable end terminations to suit the specified MBS, and the manufacture of these products were completed inhouse by Arcus Wire Group.

Stainless steel was specified for its longevity and durability, particularly with the water control gates being submerged in irrigation water. In addition, stainless steel was chosen over aluminium in the materials specification to extend the nominated asset life from 25 years to 50 plus years. The gates have been integral to improving the efficiency and productivity of water delivery, and the use of stainless steel offers an economically maintainable and longer lasting infrastructure solution.

All new gates installed are stainless steel and telemetry-enabled for remote control, a capability that has radically changed the way Murray Irrigation manages water delivery to its customers.