Lilydale Food Waste to Energy Facility

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Spiire Gippsland Lilydale Food Waste to Energy Project

One of the largest bioenergy facilities of its kind in Victoria, we’re proud to have played a part in bringing Yarra Valley Water’s new Food Waste to Energy Facility to life.

Services

Civil Engineering Surveying and Spatial

Client

Delorean Corporation

Location

Lilydale, VIC

Spiire Gippsland Survey Lilydale Food Waste to Energy Project

Spiire was engaged by Delorean Corporation to provide Surveying and Civil Engineering services for Yarra Valley Water’s new Food Waste to Energy project in Lilydale.

The second such project to be commissioned by Yarra Valley Water, this facility was designed to process approximately 55,000 tonnes of diverted organic food waste into clean renewable energy every year.

Our Civil Engineering team was engaged in 2022 to provide a concept design for the facility and 1.2km access road including a crossing over the Yarra Valley Rail Trail and a bridge crossing of a Melbourne Water creek.

Within the site, located on Yarra Valley Water land north of the Lilydale Sewage Treatment Plant and west of Maroondah Highway, the scope included a range of tasks. Initially, extensive earthworks were undertaken to remove unstable soil working with geotechnical advice to provide an appropriate base for construction. The Civil Engineering team worked with structural engineers, planning and flood modelling consultants to develop levels across the site. Pavement and structural slab levels facilitated construction of the primary structures as well as the installation of plant equipment.

To ensure EPA protection from potential contamination, the team aided in the coordination and design of the bunded tank farm with an isolated drainage network.

The site’s drainage and detention basin were also designed to provide flood compensation for the filled area and mitigate impacts to the surrounding waterways. The team also worked with Delorean to coordinate the service set out for the facility, including electrical, water, sewage and fire prevention services.

The new access road design involved levelling, grading and drainage to integrate with the existing landscape. In consultation with structural engineers and flood modelling consultants, the Civil team developed levels for the span bridge crossing over a Melbourne Water creek, forming part of the access road. The team also worked with traffic engineers in conjunction with Council and Vic Track to design a safe bike and pedestrian crossing for the Yarra Rail Trail.

Spiire’s Survey team was originally engaged to provide surveying services to support the Civil team’s design. However, as the project progressed to the construction stage, our Survey team was subsequently engaged to provide ongoing survey support to the project.

Scheduled for construction completion in 2025, once fully operational this new facility will have the capacity to generate 39,000KWh resulting in 24,700tCO2-e in emission reductions.

Engineering construction survey expertise

With particular expertise in engineering construction survey, surveyors from our Ballarat and Gippsland offices joined forces to provide precise set-out for concrete formwork, all the steel structural elements onsite, and pre-pour / post-pour verifications for the concrete elements in the waste facility and the new bridge crossing.

Set-out precision was of critical importance to facilitate accuracy at each phase of the new facility’s construction, especially for the new bridge installation onsite. Set out for the installation of bridge piles, steel dowels, pre-cast bridge head stock supports and deck beams were calculated, checked and confirmed. It was this diligence to detail that identified variations in design detail prior to concrete pours, triggering a design review and ensuring the deck beams landed seamlessly onsite without issue or lost time.

Careful GPS and Total Station observations established the required survey control, whilst rigorous onsite monitoring of locations throughout the entire construction process ensured precise placement of each component.

With a keen understanding of the expectations and requirements of engineering setout, and our established culture of collaboration and knowledge sharing, our Ballarat and Gippsland surveyors were able to work together to satisfy the client’s requirements.