Spandau waterworks

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View of the main building from Pionierstrasse

The Spandau waterworks is one of the Berliner Wasserbetriebe , which with a total of nine individual waterworks ensures the drinking water supply for the city of Berlin and parts of the Brandenburg area. The plant in the Berlin district of Spandau was built on what was then the western edge on the terrain of the Falkenhagener Feld . It was planned in the 1890s under the responsibility of Albert Haack , Head of Department for the Berlin Waterworks, and opened in 1897. In 1959 an extension followed on the same site. The Spandau and Tegel waterworks have been working together since the 1970s and supply more than 150,000 m³ of fresh water every day.

History and description

The sudden increase in the population in Berlin and the peripheral areas towards the end of the 19th century required the expansion of the infrastructure , especially the water supply and sewage disposal . In the 1890s , the administration of the then independent city of Spandau, together with the existing municipal waterworks in Berlin, commissioned the engineer architect Walter Pfeffer with the construction and expansion of the irrigation and drainage system. Pfeffer was in charge of the construction of the waterworks, which after its commissioning pumped groundwater from several deep wells and began supplying the city of Spandau in 1897. The address was Pionierstrasse.

View of the historic gatehouse

It did not take long and an expansion was necessary, so that in 1925 the capacity could be increased through renovation work and renewal of the technology. After the incorporation of Spandau into Greater Berlin in 1920 and above all after the Second World War , a higher capacity and better water purity could be achieved in 1955 by commissioning a horizontal filter well. The construction of another plant and the installation of a rapid filter system proved necessary in 1959. The Spandau and Tegel waterworks have joined forces to create a more even and secure supply to Berlin households in the west and north.

Modern technology and quality assurance of the drinking water

The waterworks can produce up to 160,000 cubic meters of fresh water per day. A total of 44 vertical wells are used for this purpose, which pump the groundwater from depths between 35 and 52 meters using submersible motor pumps. There is also the above-mentioned horizontal filter well. At full load, the pumps create up to 250 cubic meters of water per hour. The wells are arranged in three well galleries.

The raw water is processed into drinking water through two rectangular ventilation chambers with 400 nozzles, which are connected to a filter hall with ten open double filters. The total filter area is specified as 700 square meters and filter speeds between 5.5 and 13.6 meters / hour are achieved.

The Berlin Nature Conservation Foundation , which has established a quality laboratory in Spandau , works to ensure consistent quality . Among other things, it also works with young people who can work here as part of the Voluntary Ecological Year .

The replenishment of the underground water supplies has been ensured since 1982 by a groundwater enrichment system with a surface water treatment system : the roughly cleaned surface water of the Havel is let into the groundwater area via seepage basins as well as natural ditches and ponds, 20 million liters of water are thus fed into the cycle.

Incident and more

  • In 2011, during a routine check, coliforms were discovered in drinking water from the Spandau waterworks. As a result, one of the fountain galleries was initially switched off, and the Spandauer and other customers were asked to only use the water in the boiled state. The cause of the contamination could not be clearly identified, but the addition of chlorine destroyed the germs, so that the “all-clear” could be given from July of that year.
  • In some media, the Spandau waterworks is referred to as a “secret place”. The “Mein Spandau” initiative invited visitors to visit them in November 2012.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Pfefferweg. In: Street name lexicon of the Luisenstädtischer Bildungsverein (near  Kaupert ) with information about Walter Pfeffer
  2. ↑ Pionierstrasse . In: Berliner Adreßbuch , 1922, part 4, p. 1183. “Städtische Wasserwerke” (located between Falkenhagener Forst and the railway).
  3. ↑ Water Quality Laboratory and the FÖJ Nature Conservation Foundation, accessed on May 23, 2013
  4. ↑ Sabine Beikler: Water is further purified . In: Der Tagesspiegel , July 30, 2011, accessed on May 23, 2013
  5. ↑ Invitation to visit the Spandau waterworks on November 23, 2012 , accessed on May 22, 2013

Coordinates: 52 ° 33 '26.6 "  N , 13 ° 9' 46.9"  E