West Cumbria update

Since we started construction in 2017 – things are really starting to come together!  

We’ve been out and about to capture just how things are progressing on our plans to provide a more resilient and sustainable water supply for our customers in West Cumbria.

It’s been a busy time so far, and our site teams are well underway laying pipe and building the new water treatment works at Williamsgate. Construction has also started at the sites for our new underground service reservoirs and pumping station.  

The weather has sometimes made things more challenging (it does rain quite a bit), but the drier summer period helped the teams to increase the average length of pipe being laid each week and there is over 65km of pipe in the ground.

We've now completed two of the five tunnel sections as part of the project (PDF78KB opens in a new window).  The specialist tunnel boring machines, 'Druzella' and 'Diggory', were named by children from St Herbert's school in Keswick. At 2.8 metres tall, with 40 cutting teeth and weighing in at 54 tonnes the largest machine 'Diggory' completed the 1.25km tunnel in the Castlerigg area in 15 weeks! 

The team are now preparing the sites for our remaining tunnels which will take the pipeline under the River Derwent and A66 near Cockermouth, and two further tunnels in the Keswick area to form part of the new water network.