EBBW VALE STEELWORKS

The demolition of the Ebbw Vale Steelworks was started in 2002 and completed over a three year period ending in  2005.

The project entailed the removal of all plant and equipment, the complete demolition to ground level of all building on the site and disposal of the downtakings.

                                                                     Before                                                                               

                                                                        After

The majority of the buildings were demolished by conventional means utilising our fleet of excavators, including high reach, with grab, shear, breaker and bucket attachments.  All the brick and concrete was crushed on site and stockpiled for use as infill of some of the basements and trenches.  Much of the work included removal of plant and equipment from the vast array of basements and tunnels under the site this required the employment of special techniques to ensure the safe execution of this phase

Many of the buildings had asbestos lining boards under the roof sheets.  After consultation with the HSE we  employed a careful remote demolition method to remove the sheets to minimise risk to our employees from working at height. Monitoring took place all around the site to ensure that the suppression systems used were successful and these confirmed that no fibre release left the area of operations.

One massive building, the pickle line, was too much for even our high reach machines and that we collapsed by explosive means to reduce in height to a level where the machines could take over.  This entailed the decanting of local residents for a couple of hours and careful monitoring of the air pressure and vibration levels during the blast to confirm the success of the special measures put in place to minimise the impact on the surrounding community.  This was successfully accomplished and the residents were pleased with the sudden improvement in the view from their houses following the collapse.

For safety reasons the pits and basements which were not being infilled were either being capped with concrete slabs or surrounded with permanent fencing.  The remaining basements and tunnels are being used to provide site drainage until the redevelopment takes place.