An Evaluation of the Historical Approaches to Uncertainty In
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AN EVALUATION OF THE HISTORICAL APPROACHES TO UNCERTAINTY IN THE PROVISION OF VICTORIAN RESERVOIRS IN THE UK, AND THE IMPLICATIONS FOR FUTURE WATER RESOURCES PLANNING By WILLIAM BRADFORD A Thesis Submitted to the University of Birmingham for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY School of Civil Engineering College of Engineering and Physical Sciences The University of Birmingham July 2012 University of Birmingham Research Archive e-theses repository This unpublished thesis/dissertation is copyright of the author and/or third parties. The intellectual property rights of the author or third parties in respect of this work are as defined by The Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 or as modified by any successor legislation. Any use made of information contained in this thesis/dissertation must be in accordance with that legislation and must be properly acknowledged. Further distribution or reproduction in any format is prohibited without the permission of the copyright holder. ABSTRACT Attitudes to large Victorian reservoir schemes range from being unnecessarily grandiose to being grateful for a wonderful legacy. The sizing of three Victorian reservoir schemes at Thirlmere for Manchester, Lake Vyrnwy for Liverpool, and Elan Valley for Birmingham, was strongly influenced by ambitious Corporations, and the Victorian engineers’ judgment of the demand forecast, respectively JF Bateman, Thomas Hawksley and James Mansergh. In this research, the “risk averseness” of design size is used as a surrogate for uncertainty, and a novel lag-time method, which involves extraction of data from supply and demand balance diagrams, enables comparisons. The full Elan scheme design is found to be the least risk averse, and the original Thirlmere scheme design the most risk averse. In comparison with a contemporary large reservoir design, the tentative conclusion is reached that using the lag- time model approach, the recent proposal by Thames Water Utilities for a 100 Mm3 design for an Upper Thames Reservoir, in terms of future supply and demand, is a more risky design size than any of the Victorian designs. Water resources planners would be interested in the analysis and comparison of risk averseness and efficiency of design for other types of historical and modern schemes. i DEDICATION I dedicate this thesis to my wife Maxine, who has been very patient throughout the four years it has taken me to get to the finishing line. I would also like to dedicate it to the Victorian engineers who were responsible for leaving us a remarkable legacy of upland reservoirs and gravity aqueducts. In the photograph below, James Mansergh (on horseback) was the water engineer who designed and constructed the Elan scheme in Mid-Wales. Elan has supplied nearly all the water needs of Birmingham for the past 108 years, and the scheme is expected to do so for many years to come. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express my appreciation to Dr John Bridgeman and Professor Mark Gaterell for their support, encouragement and supervision during this research project. This final report would not have been possible without their supervision, expert knowledge, advice and support. I would like to thank the University of Birmingham and the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) Research and Enabling Fund for funding this project, and to thank Carol Morgan, the archivist at ICE, for her help in locating historic documents. The historic photographs are published by kind permission of the Radnorshire Museum, Llandrindod Wells. I am indebted to my fellow research students Rebecca Sindall and Sally Barnett in the School of Civil Engineering for generously giving of their time, and applying their Word skills, to help me in the last fortnight of this project to produce the final report. Finally, I would like to acknowledge Dr. Roy Ward of The University of Hull, Professor Mike Hamlin of the University of Birmingham, and Dr. Terry Kitson – deceased, of Severn Trent Water who inspired me to become an engineering hydrologist. iii ABBREVIATIONS AAR Annual Average Rainfall AOD Above ordnance datum BWCo Birmingham Waterworks Company CBWD City of Birmingham Water Department CEO Chief Executive Officer DCM Domestic Consumption Monitor DEFRA Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs DO Deployable Output DoE Department of the Environment DWI Drinking Water Inspectorate DWRMP Draft Water Resources Management Plan EA Environment Agency EEC European Economic Community ELoL Economic level of leakage EU European Union FRS Fellow of the Royal Society GARD Group Against Reservoir Development HoC House of Commons HoCSC House of Commons Select Committee HoL House of Lords HoLSC House of Lords Select Committee ICE Institution of Civil Engineers LCC London County Council LTM Lag-time model LTOA Lower Thames Operating Agreement Mg Million gallons Mgd Million gallons per day Ml Megalitres Ml/d Megalitres per day mm Millimetres Mm3 Million metres cubed MWB Metropolitan Water Board NGO Non-governmental organisation NRA National Rivers Authority Ofwat Water Services Regulation Authority ONS Office of National Statistics OPCS Office of Population Censuses and Surveys PCC Per Capita Consumption rdWRMP Revised draft Water Resources Management Plan iv SR Service Reservoir STW Severn Trent Water TDA Thirlmere Defence Association TH Target Headroom TW Thames Water TWL Top Water Level TWU Thames Water Utilities UKWIR UK Water Industry Research UTR Upper Thames Reservoir UU United Utilities WAFU Water Available For Use WHO World Health Organization WIA Water Industry Act 1991 WRB Water Resources Board WRMP Water Resources Management Plan WW1 World War I WW2 World War II v Table of Contents Abstract ........................................................................................................................... i Dedication .......................................................................................................................... ii Acknowledgements .................................................................................................................. iii Abbreviations ......................................................................................................................... iv List of Figures ........................................................................................................................ xv List of Tables ....................................................................................................................... xix CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................... 1 1.1 Why is this project being undertaken? ......................................................................... 1 1.2 Setting the Scene: Victorian and modern water supply service ................................... 3 1.3 Setting the Scene: Response to Drought ...................................................................... 7 CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW .............................................................................. 9 2.1 Introduction to the Literature Review .......................................................................... 9 2.1.1 Structure of the Literature Review ....................................................................... 9 2.1.2 Selection of the Elan Reservoirs Scheme for analysis ....................................... 11 2.1.3 Selection of Thirlmere and Vyrnwy Schemes for analysis ................................ 11 2.1.4 Selection of the proposed Upper Thames Reservoir for analysis ....................... 14 2.2 Historical Context, Victorian Cities ........................................................................... 15 vi 2.2.1 Britain’s Victorian Cities .................................................................................... 15 2.2.2 London ................................................................................................................ 16 2.2.3 Birmingham ........................................................................................................ 17 2.2.4 Birmingham Institutions ..................................................................................... 19 2.2.5 Birmingham Decision Makers ............................................................................ 20 2.2.6 Manchester water supplies prior to Thirlmere .................................................... 23 2.2.7 Liverpool supplies prior to Vyrnwy scheme ...................................................... 25 2.3 Historical Context; Victorian Water Engineers and Methods Used .......................... 26 2.3.1 Britain’s Victorian Water Engineers .................................................................. 26 2.3.2 Victorian estimates of demand ........................................................................... 31 2.3.3 Victorian estimation of water supply reservoir yield ......................................... 31 2.3.4 Awareness emerges of Uncertainty in Rainfall data estimation ......................... 34 2.4 The Three Victorian Reservoir Schemes; Description and Data Sources ................. 35 2.4.1 Summary Description of the Three Schemes ..................................................... 35 2.4.2 Description of the Elan Scheme for Birmingham .............................................. 38 2.4.3 Why Wales? Support for the Elan scheme ......................................................... 46 2.4.4 Opposition to the Elan scheme ..........................................................................