Leak Detection – Cockatoo Island Sydney
Detection Services were asked by the Harbour Trust Sydney to help them account for 100 litres a minute being lost from their water system on Cockatoo Island.
Cockatoo Island was a very unique and interesting opportunity for Detection Services for a number of reasons. Cockatoo Island has been in operation since mid 1800’s the structure and infastructure has changed dramatically over the years, not only was the water reticulation infastructure old, the exact location of all the pipes were not known for the whole of the island.
Cockatoo Island has numerous old office buildings as well as some large factories which in turn had internal and external pipework which needed to be checked for possible leakage.
Over three days Detection Services undertook a detailed survey of every water main and water supply which was shown on the plans, as well as other mains and supplies that we subsequently discovered which were not shown on the plans. All leakage discovered during the survey was located by our experienced technicians assisted by the latest state of the art technology.
Although a number of smaller leaks were indentified the total estimated loss of water found on the island was only 21 litres a minute, leaving 79 litres a minute still unaccounted for.
Our first concern was that the amount being lost was not as high as first thought, we therefore decided to take a more detailed examination of the flow meters on the mainland. After cross verifying the water balance figures, sure enough the amount being lost was indeed confirmed to be 100 litres a minute.
Cockatoo Islands has two independant 12”diameter (300mm) water supplies running from the mainland under the Parramatta River, a distance of approximatley 500m.
No Telltale leakage noise could be heard from either of the two inlet valves on the island but when we checked the two mainland isolation valves, a leak was identified on one of the two mains. Detection 
Services carried out more tests to determin the position of the suspected leak using Primayer Enigma Loggers. This instrument is based upon the very latest digital technology and we were very quickly able to pin point the leak as being 250 metres from the mainland valve more or less smack in the middle of the pipe run under the Parramatta River.
The substantial leak that was found was equivilent to just under a third of an olympic swimming pool being lost per week. The leak would not have been found had it not been for the knowledge and experience of Detection Services staff backed up by the latest state of the art leak detection equipment.
