A barge off the Redondo Breakwall collect debris that has been clogging the intake pipes leading to the SeaLab. The pipes will be used to provide seawater to the desalination plant, now under construction. Photo

Richard Lawrence works for Brutoco Engineering and Construction, Inc. as a project superintendent. His company recently completed a project about one-third of a mile off the King Harbor breakwater.

West Basin Municipal Water District (WBMWD), the company that hired Brutoco, has spent a bundle on improvements at the Redondo SEALab, including construction of a new steel frame building and renovation of an existing concrete mausoleum-type structure that used to house huge water pumps.

All that cash will facilitate building a reverse osmosis desalination plant that will dump the products of its operation, fresh water and concentrated brine, right back into the ocean. I know. I don’t really get it either. It has something to do with environmentalists.

One reason why the SEALab caught WBMWD’s eye was the availability of salt water. SEALab draws water from the ocean through a 10 foot diameter, 2,000 foot long concrete pipe. Lawrence’s job was to remove decades of accumulated sand, muck and man-made debris that had clogged the intake and restricted the amount of water that could get through.

The end of the pipe has an elbow and a section about 30 feet tall that goes straight up. The 14 foot diameter vertical section extends about 10 feet above the sea floor.

Lawrence and Brutoco had two objectives, clean out all the debris and pull more than 2000 feet of plastic pipe from the ocean through the existing concrete pipe to the SEALab.

They subcontracted the actual underwater work to West Diving Services, Inc. a company that specializes in underwater construction, repairs, search and salvage. “It was very nasty. It was a one man gig. He was manhandling an 8-inch suction hose just sitting there chiseling away and sucking up all this crap,” Lawrence said.

The debris had collected all the way down the 30-foot vertical section and about 120 feet back toward shore. This wasn’t a working environment for anyone who suffers from claustrophobia.

They pumped the dredged material about 40 feet to the surface and collected it in a 15-cubic-yard bin that sat on a barge. The bin was brought to shore and lifted from the barge by a huge, 350 ton Grove crane. From there it was trucked to the yard at the AES power plant to dry before disposal in a landfill.

The pipe Brutoco needed to pull through the newly cleaned concrete pipe was a composite of four six-inch and one four-inch diameter, High Density Polyethylene pipes lashed together.

Brutoco assembled the pipe bundle in Long Beach, sealed the ends of the pipes to trap air then towed the 2000+ foot, floating snake up to King Harbor. It sat just inside the breakwater while the crew prepared the concrete pipe.

They ran a line out from the shore to pull a cable in from the barge. The end of the cable was attached to the pipe bundle and it was pulled from the shore side all the way through the concrete pipe to the SEALab. “It went beautifully, just the way we envisioned it,” Lawrence said.

WBMWD has gone to great lengths to avoid antagonizing environmentalists. The desalination project will use fine screens to keep from sucking sea life through its pipes. One of the pipes in the bundle will carry air that will blast the screens every 30 minutes from the shore side to gently release any critters that find themselves pinned to the screen due to water suction. According to Lawrence, we’ll be able to see the bubbles at the surface.

When the plant’s operational, WBMWD will have Brutoco install a camera that will transmit everything that’s happening at the end of the pipe. It will be sort of like the camera that shows the oil coming out of the sea floor at the site of the Deepwater Horizon disaster. Hopefully it will have a less infuriating affect on the people who watch.

Comment on this or any other King Harbor topic at www.kingharborboater.com click on the “blog” link.

Comments:

comments so far. Comments posted to EasyReaderNews.com may be reprinted in the Easy Reader print edition, which is published each Thursday.