London Energy Secures Production with Water Direct’s WaterTight Assured Response for Demineralised Water Supply
London Energy plays a vital role in North London’s waste management strategy, operating one of the UK’s longest-serving energy-from-waste facilities. The facility’s primary goal is to maintain uninterrupted waste incineration, ensuring a consistent throughput to process non-recyclable municipal waste – diverting it from landfill and converting it into usable energy that is fed back into the grid.
As a critical part of the region’s waste management and energy infrastructure, the site relies on a closed-loop water system that recovers, treats, and reuses demineralised water across its boilers and turbines to drive its core processes. However, the criticality of the water supply and the age of the infrastructure — combined with limited water storage — exposed the business to serious risk.
With an upgrade to the facility scheduled for 2027, London Energy needed a reliable interim solution to mitigate the risk of lost production and ensure uninterrupted operations over the next few years.
The Challenge
London Energy’s existing storage capacity stood at 90m³, providing only up to 12 hours of operational coverage. Any delays in replenishing supply could result in a full halt in waste processing — leading to potential backlogs, increased landfill diversion, and possible financial penalties for waste redirection.
Given the specialist nature of demineralised water, lead times for emergency supply were unpredictable, making reactive ordering an unsustainable approach. London Energy needed a proactive, guaranteed contingency plan to protect waste processing operations in the run-up to a major infrastructure upgrade scheduled for 2027.
The Solution: WaterTight
To address this challenge, Water Direct proposed a two-year retained emergency assured response contract under its WaterTight package – later extended to three years. This agreement guaranteed a 14-hour mobilisation of two dedicated water tankers to site whenever required, ensuring that waste throughput could continue even in the event of a supply disruption.
This proactive arrangement eliminated the uncertainty of lead times and allowed the operations team to plan water usage effectively, preventing costly disruptions.
Business Impact
By partnering with Water Direct, London Energy now benefits from a reliable and structured contingency plan, significantly reducing the operational risk associated with water supply shortages. With a guaranteed response time in place, the company can confidently ensure operational continuity until its facility upgrade is completed in 2027.
Client Testimonial
“This was an essential service to put in place. Given the specialist nature of the product, we knew that there could be long lead times from the point of call to delivery. Having a guaranteed response time enabled our production team to plan better and ensure the facility continued to produce power.”
Ben Hillyear, Operations Manager at London Energy
Conclusion
Water Direct’s WaterTight Assured Response package provided London Energy with the reliability, efficiency, and certainty required to manage its demineralised water needs.
This case study underscores the critical role of proactive contingency planning in industrial operations, particularly where specialised water supply is essential to production continuity.
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