Aerial photographs of the Radyr Weir Hydroelectric Scheme.

Dawnus Construction Limited. Cardiff, Wales

LogoWe were asked to take photos of something a little different this week. Dawnus Construction Limited is a large civil engineering and construction company with their head office in Swansea, South Wales. They were commissioned by the Cardiff Council Energy Department to build the new Hydro-Electric power station at Radyr Weir, just on the outskirts of Cardiff. We had actually filmed at the site with the drones a few weeks earlier for a BBC documentary but we were concentrating on the River Taff and were unaware of the scale of the project that Dawnus were working on.

The main focus of the day’s filming was the installation of the two colossal Archimedes Turbine Screws. We were asked to capture some aerial photographs of the screws as they were being lifted into place. I wasn’t aware what an Archimedes Screw was so a quick ‘Google’ was needed to research the job. The resulting figures are mind boggling. Each screw is capable of a throughput of 4000 litres of water per second and between them they will ultimately be providing Cardiff with 1.6GWh of renewable energy per year.

The guys at Dawnus are working to a very tight schedule as the deadline for the screws to start producing power is the 18th December. The site has been running 24 hours, 7 days a week to get the job finished in time. Their professionalism and knowledge of the project was clear to see and it was a pleasure working with a company such as this.

Once the project is finished, Cardiff Council Energy Department will be inviting various schools from around Wales to visit the site to learn more about the renewable energy schemes that are so important for the future of Wales. The land surrounding the site will also be reclaimed and turned back into the beautiful parkland that we are used to seeing along the banks of the River Taff in Cardiff.

Here are a few of the photos that we took on the day and a short video showing the scale of the project.

Read more about Dawnus Construction here: http://www.dawnus.co.uk/

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