Solutions - Water Cut-Off and Stabilisation

Exclusion of water seepage through the ground or structures often requires lateral thinking and innovative approaches. With a variety of different situations successfully resolved to date BAM Ritchies is ideally placed to develop solutions using the right techniques to achieve our Client’s requirements.

In their largest contract completed to date, BAM Ritchies undertook the £22 million hydraulic isolation of Intermediate Level Nuclear Waste in a 65 metre deep shaft at Dounreay in Caithness.

The solution was the result of a programme extending over five years involving feasibility study, investigation, trails, construction of a working platform, drilling and permeation grouting of the strata around the shaft using ultrafine cement to reduce the anticipated water make during the waste removal to less than 15 cubic metres per day – a fraction of the original anticipated water make.

The Dounreay Shaft Isolation Project was Highly Commended in the 2009 Ground Engineering Awards and received the prestigious 2009 British Construction Industry Award for the Civil Engineering Project valued between £3 and £50 million.

Example job sheet:
• Dounreay Shaft Isolation Project