Sulzer recently was asked to upgrade a 100-year-old pump installation in New Orleans, LA as part of a long-term program to improve the performance and resilience of the city’s water system.
Built in the 1920s, the Oak Street Intake Pump Station is vital to New Orleans’ water supply network. The station’s three main pumps can each deliver up to 80 million gallons (363,000 m3) of water per day.
After almost a century, the station’s original pumps were becoming unreliable. The project to upgrade and replace the Oak Street facility’s pumps was quite difficult because all works had to be completed without modifications to the existing building. Sulzer was able to provide a design with sufficient capacity to fit in the footprint of the original units. Despite some installation challenges, the new Sulzer pumps have been tested and are ready for operation.
The SMDV 1000-1030A pumps are a standard product but had to be customized for the project. Sulzer pump experts in the US, Switzerland and China designed and built the single-stage, double suction, axially split pumps and their ancillary equipment.
Image credit: Sulzer