Industrial services group Hargreaves has designed and constructed a 650-metre long conveyor system that includes three bridges in a bid to reduce carbon emissions on the building of HS2.
The Durham-based firm is delivering significant earth moving works on a section of the rail project near Aylesbury, in Buckinghamhire, and has devised the novel solution as a means to cut out the use of diesel-fuelled HGVs that would otherwise haul the debris away. Hargreaves' engineers gave the conveyor its first operational run last month having designed and built it in less than a year.
The snaking construction includes three bridges, 800 tonnes of steel, 21km of cables and two high voltage substations. Hargreaves says 100,000 hours of work have gone into the project which, once fully up and running in April, is hoped to remove 1.5m miles of HGV journeys from nearby roads.
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The scheme is intended to reduce carbon emissions on HS2 by more than 5,000 tonnes and has already picked up a key civil engineering award for project of the year in the best environmental and sustainable initiative category at the C23 awards.
Last month, Hargreaves revealed a big jump in revenue and profits - driven in part by its HS2 work delivered via its Blackwell Earthmoving business. At its peak the group has employed 400 people on the contract. In an update on its performance in the six months to the end of November, Hargreaves said had increased 53% year-on-year to £116.5m while pre-tax profit had grown from £10.4m to £18.7m.
Gordon Banham, CEO of Hargreaves, said: "I am delighted that our innovative five section, 650m conveyor system on the Aylesbury section of HS2 is ready to go into full operation after successful commissioning last month. The system is a perfect example of how Hargreaves can identify value adding initiatives and design, build and manufacture bespoke engineering solutions on a short timescale, to deliver significant impacts.
"The conveyor solution will reduce the project’s carbon emissions by over 5,000 tonnes by removing 1.15 million miles of HGV traffic from local roads and reducing diesel consumption by around 1.6m litres. Hargreaves has a range of engineering initiatives which it is pursuing that can bring substantial sustainable environmental and economic benefits to a number of industrial and infrastructure projects."
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