SA Water safeguards the environment and its people

SA Water’s Senior Manager of Capital Delivery, Peter Seltsikas, spoke to The Australian Pipeliner about meeting the challenges of remote projects – from environmental protection to looking after the mental health of isolated workers.

In February 2022, SA Water announced its intention to renew 34 kilometres of the Morgan to Whyalla Pipeline as part of a $62 million investment in securing reliable water services for 100,000 of its regional customers. The 358-kilometre above ground pipe transports treated River Murray water from the Morgan Water Treatment Plant.

In August of that year, a new threatened ecological community was identified by the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water (DCCEEW). The Mallee Bird Community is a collection of around 20 different bird species, many of which have habitats at various points along the Morgan to Whyalla Pipeline.

This meant that SA Water’s teams, including Senior Manager of Capital Delivery Peter Seltsikas, decided to redesign the project to make sure that it could be safely completed with minimal impact to the Mallee Bird Community.

Seltsikas said that SA Water has always acknowledged the need to think differently about the way work is prioritised based on risk assessments and the capacity for non-invasive methodologies.

“Technologies have included advanced condition assessments, including smart technologies that use audio information to listen to water flow through pipes and identify faults before failures can occur,” he said. “On top of that, when we expand or replace sections of the network, we look for more durable pipe materials than we used in the past.”

In the case of the Morgan to Whyalla Pipeline project, it has become important for SA Water to assess how it works in regards to the particular conditions of the environment.

“We obviously have to minimise the amount of vegetation clearing that we’re going to do,” Seltsikas said. “But we also need to look at protecting threatened communities – like the Mallee Bird Community – by avoiding habitat destruction.”

The issue is that the native birds in those areas tend to nest in hollow-bearing trees. Part of SA Water’s solution, aside from avoiding these trees, has been to reduce the construction corridor for the works by about three metres.

One of the difficulties is that the renewal project has to follow the existing pipeline infrastructure, limiting the company’s ability to adjust.

But SA Water is adapting by adopting methodologies that focus on environmental harm reduction and operations to offset what damage is done.

“Rather than clearing the land, we’re using a slashing method,” Seltsikas said.

Slashing involves cutting plant life down near the base, rather than removing plants from the soil. By slashing, regrowth occurs a lot faster as flora doesn’t need to reseed but can instead grow from established root systems. As an additional bonus, it means that the site needn’t be revegetated.

Environmental impact and conservation are vitally important. But Seltsikas says that operators of remote worksites, such as is required for the Morgan to Whyalla Pipeline renewal, also need to make sure they look after things a little closer to home.

He says that remote work can be isolating for work crews, and that this isolation can have a very real impact on mental health.

“We’re very conscious of the importance of considering employees mental health,” Seltsikas said. “We are working very closely with contractors to make sure that crews are looked after – with rosters making sure they get time away from the worksite and ensuring that the facilities are adequate.”

With over 600 people working in SA Water’s programs at any given time, Seltsikas said that the company considers psychosocial safety to be of key importance to the overall safety of each project.

It is impossible to avoid some impact on the environment when building pipelines. As Australia’s population grows and demand on utilities increases, companies like SA Water have to expand their networks.

“Ultimately, we have to build infrastructure. It’s part of how we deliver reliably to over 1.7 million customers,” Seltsikas said. “But we have to make sure that we keep our people’s wellbeing, and the surrounding environment, at the forefront of our thoughts.”

He says that operators need to be conscious of what’s happening in the environment so that they can respond to it quickly and efficiently.

“We’ve gone through a rigorous process of understanding in response to the Mallee Bird Community,” he said. “But it doesn’t end there. We’re continually monitoring and scanning the area to keep on top of how our work environment is changing.”

This article featured in the March edition of The Australian Pipeliner.