Logan Water and Downer regularly isolate parts of Logan City’s water supply network to perform repairs, maintenance and asset replacements. Water isolations can be challenging with aging infrastructure, locating network valves or when valves are not in the correct position for a smooth network isolation.
Logan Water and Downer worked with safety and quality management personnel, network operators, supervisors, valve turners and construction workers to develop an innovative but simple isolation lock for buried valves. The lock consists of a steel plate that is placed over a buried valve. The plate then locks into place with an individually keyed lock and a warning tag, making it clear to workers when water infrastructure is, or is not, isolated. The use of individually keyed locks also makes it easier to identify who is working on a particular isolation.
A worker focused training package that included video demonstrations of the process and process maps was delivered to site supervisors and field staff to clearly define the roles and responsibilities for each step of the isolation process.
Since implementation of the new valve lock and water network isolation process Logan City Council and Downer have achieved a more than 90 per cent success rate for isolations.
