Schierstein waterworks

Site of the waterworks in late autumn

The waterworks Schierstein of Hessenwasser is located on the Rhine between Wiesbaden and Walluf in Hesse and belongs to the Route of Industrial Culture Rhein-Main Wiesbaden . It serves as a water supply for Wiesbaden and consists of a waterworks for pumping groundwater , a treatment plant for river water , which was closed in 2017, and an ecologically important outdoor area with a white stork colony , which is designated as a water protection area .

location

Aerial photos of the Rhine from 1953, left picture with infiltration basin and Niederwallufer bay , right picture with groundwater works above the center and Schierstein harbor on the right edge

The water plant is located west of the Schiersteiner port in the local district Schierstein the Hesse state capital Wiesbaden and the Rheingau-Taunus-Kreis belonging place Niederwalluf . To the south is the Niederwallufer Bay nature reserve on the right bank of the Upper Rhine .

History of the plant

Neo-Romanesque building from the beginning of the 20th century

Wiesbaden is known for its thermal springs such as the Kochbrunnen . On the other hand, there is a complete lack of potable groundwater that could be tapped into through deep wells . Therefore, in the history of Wiesbaden , drinking water sources in the Taunus were already developed at the time of the Roman settlement Aquae Mattiacorum . Since the beginning of the central drinking water supply around 1870 there were problems to ensure the supply, which is why the first drainage galleries and flat tunnels were built by 1875. Between 1875 and 1907 Münzbergstollen , Schläferskopfstollen , Kellerskopfstollen and Kreuzstollen were created for water extraction .

After exploratory drilling, the first eight groundwater wells were put into operation on the not yet fortified bank of Schierstein between 1899 and 1901, which initially only served to supply process water . As the operation progressed, the water quality deteriorated as the proportion of bank filtrate that was contaminated with iron and manganese increased . To do this, the wells were flooded during floods . Therefore, the first hydraulic engineering interventions, the backfilling of the old Rhine arms and the dike were carried out .

Due to the growing demand, the funding was expanded between 1904 and 1907 with a brick plant in Romanizing style, which, according to the municipal tender, was to be carried out "in a perfectly artful association". This enabled usable and drinking water to be provided in parallel. From this construction phase, the boiler and machine house of the pumping station as well as the building of the filter system and the filter houses have been preserved, the chimney was not preserved.

In the 1920s, the separate service water supply was given up. Between 1921 and 1924, large sedimentation and infiltration basins were created to artificially enrich the groundwater. For this purpose, surface water was pumped out from the middle of the Rhine , filtered and seeped into the sand and gravel near the bank, in order to then pump it back up again via deep wells. The extraction point was created in the middle of the river in order to avoid the heavily polluted wastewater plume of the Main flowing in from the right at the tip of the Main, as well as today's industrial park Kalle-Albert . After the Second World War , the demand increased and at the same time there were several severe droughts, so that the expansion of the Schierstein waterworks was planned. In addition, the water quality of the river water deteriorated in the 1950s.

Rhine water treatment plant, seen from Niederwalluf , 2020

Systems close to the Rhine water treatment

In 1960, the separate Rhine water treatment plant ( ⊙ ) , located southwest of the dike , was put into operation, which had a nominal output of 24,000 cubic meters per day. The water was subjected to the steps of chlorination , precipitation with iron chloride , treatment with activated carbon , decarbonization and filtration through a gravel filter . The basin system, which is used for sedimentation and biological cleaning, but also as a reservoir, was retained. The water was over a 940 meter long fountain series of 30 injection wells and a horizontally installed gallery into the soil percolates . In 1964, a second extraction line was laid in the Rhine and a ventilation cascade was built. The extracted water was made up of four sources: real groundwater flowing from the Taunus , pre-clarified basin infiltrate, treated infiltrate from seepage wells and galleries and, depending on the water level of the Rhine, bank filtrate . 50.03776 8.17331

View over the area, behind it Hof Nürnberg and the telecommunications tower on the Hohe Wurzel

In 1979 a new groundwater treatment plant went into operation in Schierstein, which can pump 36,000 cubic meters per day through 42 vertical wells. It removes iron and manganese and oxidizes the ammonium , organic trace substances are filtered out with activated carbon . This is followed by 18 sand filters . In 1997 four seepage trenches, each 75 m long, were put into operation. Around the year 2000 the waterworks supplied around 30% of Wiesbaden's drinking water, while around 40% came from the Hessian Ried , which was connected to Wiesbaden's drinking water supply in 1969, and the rest from the Taunus .

In 2005 the system was transferred from ESWE supply to Hessenwasser . In 2008 it was decided to renew the waterworks and convert to a new process. In 2012, the 42 wells were replaced by two horizontal filter wells with modern pump technology, which reduced the energy consumption of the pumps by 75%. Hessenwasser expected an annual output of 3.5 million cubic meters of drinking water , an average of 9600 m³ per day. In 2010 it was planned to supply the waterworks with a culvert under the Rhine from Mainz-Mombach . Instead, the Schierstein waterworks was connected to the Mainz municipal utility network with a 6.9 kilometer connection to the Petersaue in April 2016 , from where it receives up to 14,000 cubic meters of drinking water per day. On February 13, 2017, the treatment of water from the Rhine was decommissioned. Since then, the Schierstein waterworks has been a pure groundwaterworks that still covers around 20% of Wiesbaden's water supply.

In 2017, Hessenwasser began modernizing and converting the groundwater treatment system. In 2018 a new system was completed in which the sludge is supposed to settle as sediment . The clear water is seeped into the infiltration and sedimentation basins on the site. In 2019, a new sludge water pipe with a nominal diameter of 700 mm was laid, which directs the waste water from the filter rinsing into the new settling basins, and the electrical , measurement , control and regulation technology ( EMSR ) was renewed. The plant is to be operated at a base load of 10,080 cubic meters per day.

The water is pumped to a water tank on Carl-von-Linde-Strasse and supplied to the city from there. The hardness of the water is medium to hard. The nearby districts of Schierstein and Biebrich receive water from the Hessian Ried.

natural reserve

Systems, in the middle a flying white stork

Stork on the nearby bank of the Rhine

The site of the waterworks is known for the numerous white storks that nest there and find enough food here. The resettlement of the animals was planned in 1972, from 1975 the first pairs nested there, which grew to 24 pairs by 2014 and 27 pairs in 2020. They breed on trees, on high-voltage pylons and on nesting sites, which were specially created by the Storchengemeinschaft Schierstein e. V. were established. Since 1984 some storks have been wintering in Schierstein. In 2014 the association reported that over 1000 storks had hatched in Schierstein since 1975. The forecast by fish storks at the source of Grunsels Börnchen at Lindenbach for babies .

The infiltration basins and the surrounding facilities are a habitat for rare animals and plants. The local working group of the Hessian Society for Ornithology and Nature Conservation (HGON) has there in 2012 Mute Swan , Egyptian Goose , Mallard , grebes , white stork , marsh harrier , black kite , buzzard , kestrel , moorhen , coot , Rose-ringed Parakeet , Green Woodpecker , Red-backed Shrike , marsh warbler , reed warbler , Great reed warbler , white wagtail and reed bunting observed. In Schierstein, however, the HGON observed a significant decrease in ground-breeders , reptiles and amphibians compared to the 1960s and attributes this to the presence of storks. The area of the waterworks actually only offers food for a single pair of storks and the success of the resettlement justifies “no zoo keeping in a bird sanctuary”. The storks feed themselves in the surrounding Rhine meadows and meadows as well as the garbage dumps in Wiesbaden ( Dyckerhoffbruch ) and Budenheim .

The area is designated as a water protection area and belongs to Zone I of the landscape protection area City of Wiesbaden as well as to the bird protection area Inselrhein . In addition, individual reeds and ponds are legally protected as biotopes .

literature

Klaus Haberer: Groundwater recharge to improve quality . In: H ₂ O 3 (14), 1970, pp. 318-329, with several sketches.

Heinz-Peter Hahl, Richard Kacpura, Helmut Richter, Bernhard Post: An era is coming to an end: the Schierstein Rhine water treatment plant is shut down . Hessenwasser , annual report 2017.

Web links

Commons : Wasserwerk Schierstein - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Hessenwasser : Modernization of the Schierstein groundwater works
Historical picture of the groundwater works with chimney . Wiesbaden in the picture

Individual evidence

↑ ^a ^b ^c ^d Route of Industrial Culture Rhein-Main Wiesbaden , p. 2.

^ ^A ^b ^c Monika Drews, Andreas Dülberg: Experience of Stadtwerke Wiesbaden AG with a new high-performance process for deacidifying drinking water . In: Wasser - Abwasser 141, No. 6, 2000, p. 358.

↑ Wolfgang Merkel: Gas, water and electricity - from the history of the Wiesbaden municipal utility . August 23, 2005.

↑ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ ^j ^k ^l ^m ⁿ ^o ^p ^q ^r Heinz-Peter Hahl, Richard Kacpura, Helmut Richter, Bernhard Post: An era is coming to an end: the closure of the Schierstein Rhine water treatment plant . Hessenwasser , annual report 2017.

↑ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e Constanze Bückner, Andreas Hoppe: Mapped cities: Mainz and Wiesbaden in the field of tension between natural space and socialization . Campus, 2012, ISBN 978-3-59339573-9 , p. 86.

↑ ^a ^b Communication for Consensus . In: Inside • Out , June 2010, p. 15.

^ Konrad Zilch, Claus Jürgen Diederichs, Rolf Katzenbach, Klaus J. Beckmann (eds.): Hydraulic engineering, settlement water management, waste technology (= manual for civil engineers . Volume 5). Springer 2014, ISBN 978-3-642-41874-7 , p. 1900 .

^ Ulrich Förstner: Environmental Protection Technology: An Introduction . Springer 2013, ISBN 978-3-66210699-0 , p. 224 .

↑ Klaus Haberer: Groundwater enrichment for quality improvement . In: H ₂ O 3 (14), 1970, pp. 318-329.

↑ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e Hessenwasser : Modernization of the Schierstein groundwater works , accessed on May 20, 2020.

↑ Renewal of the Schierstein waterworks . In: Inside • Out , September 2012, p. 16.

↑ Hessenwasser : Ecological water production redefined: The modernization of the Schierstein waterworks is ongoing . Press release, November 4, 2013.

↑ Administrative agreement on the determination of the competent authority for the water law decisions on the construction and operation of the "DN 500 drinking water pipeline, Mainz to the Schierstein waterworks" (water pipeline) . In: State Gazette for the State of Hesse , No. 52, December 27, 2010, pages 2839–2840.

↑ ^a ^b Manfred Knispel: Schierstein waterworks: complete conversion of the filter technology . In: Wiesbadener Kurier , September 26, 2017.

↑ Hessenwasser : "An important pillar for a safe water supply" . Press release, May 18, 2016.

↑ ^a ^b Manfred Knispel: The Schierstein waterworks . In: Mensch Westend , May 2018, p. 12.

^ ^A ^b ^c ^d Helene Henzel: Storks in Wiesbaden: In Schierstein it rattles . In: Frankfurter Rundschau , April 14, 2014.

↑ Storks in Schierstein . Rhein-Taunus Nature Park , accessed on May 20, 2020.

^ The association , Storchengemeinschaft Wiesbaden-Schierstein eV, accessed on May 20, 2020.

↑ ^a ^b Concept for the conservation of a self-sustaining stork population in the Wiesbaden - Mainz - Bingen area . NABU Nature Conservation Center Rheinauen, accessed on May 20, 2020.

↑ So early in February 2020 and so many pairs of stings . Storchengemeinschaft Wiesbaden-Schierstein eV, February 17, 2020, accessed on May 20, 2020.

↑ Julia Anderton: Schierstein is the "Dating Room" for storks . In: Wiesbadener Kurier , March 4, 2020.

↑ Storchengemeinschaft Wiesbaden-Schierstein eV , accessed on May 20, 2020.

↑ Winter storks, Storchengemeinschaft Wiesbaden-Schierstein eV, November 26, 2019, accessed on May 20, 2020.

↑ Eva Wodarz-Eichner: Where storks fish for babies . Website of the city of Wiesbaden, published in Wiesbadener Kurier on August 30, 2004.

^ Fritz Sperling: Breeding birds in the Schierstein pond area 2012 . In: Hessian Society for Ornithology and Nature Conservation , Working Group Wiesbaden-Rheingau-Taunus (Ed.): Ornithological Annual Report 2012 , 2013, pp. 19-20.

^ Fritz Neubaur, Reiner Petersen, Otto von Helversen: Bird fauna of a small area near Schierstein and Niederwalluf in the Rheingau . Yearbooks of the Nassau Association for Natural History , Vol. 96, 1962, pp. 60–95.

↑ Johannes Reufenheuser based on notes by Dieter Zingel: Schiersteiner pond area in the 1960s and today . In: Hessian Society for Ornithology and Nature Conservation , Wiesbaden-Rheingau-Taunus Working Group (Ed.): Ornithological Annual Report 2012 , 2013, pp. 16–18.