New guidelines for irrigators nominate design specifications for intake screens, to ensure the protection of native fish species.
Effective modern screens not only protect native fish but also offer irrigators clear CapEx and OpEx benefits. These include eliminating damage caused by debris, reducing labour requirements, less energy costs, minimal water wastage and lower maintenance requirements.
Traditional screens had large apertures, extracting water at high velocities. This resulted in regular impingement and entrainment of fish and debris onto the intake, in the pipeline and throughout the downstream system.
Modern Screens specify a maximum aperture (slot width) of 2mm. This reduction in aperture size contributes to the lower approach velocities that allow aquatic life and debris to easily bypass the intake without affect. To guarantee flow volumes the surface area of modern fish screens has been increased, and a self-cleaning mechanism included.
Modern screening solutions allow options for retro-fit designs, retrieval systems and operational considerations.