Honoring Construction Safety Week in the Sunol Valley

With so much heavy construction work underway in the Sunol Valley, it is easy to forget that the men and women in the construction industry perform dangerous work often in difficult conditions to upgrade the Hetch Hetchy Regional Water System.

It is a good thing that the construction teams working on the two projects in full swing in the Sunol Valley keep safety in mind every single day.  However, this week was a little different. The teams at the Calaveras Dam Replacement Project and the Fish Passage Facilities within the Alameda Creek Watershed underwent additional trainings and reminders this week.

Why?

The first week of May is National Construction Safety Week.  Global construction industry leaders, including our contractors, joined together to form industry safety forums and an initiative called ‘Safety Week.’ The mission of Safety week is to raise awareness within the construction industry ensuring “We are Stronger and Safer Together.”

How strong?

Here in the Sunol Valley, the number of recordable workplace incidents is well below the industry average. At our Fish Passage Project, workers have clocked in over 70,000 work hours since April 2016 with zero recordable incidents.  At the Calaveras Dam Project, the largest project in the Water System Improvement Program has worked over 220,000 work hours since July 2016 with zero recordable incidents. 

Working in heat and rain, on large earth-moving equipment or in tight spaces next to a creek, our crews are showing that every week is safety week.

We are proud of our teams out in Sunol Valley! Stay safe out there.

Crews overseeing operations at the future Fish Passage Facilities

Center of photo shows construction crews at Calaveras Dam placing
Clay Core materials in the replacement dam at elevation 567 ft 

Butterflies, Gates and Sleeves, Oh, My!

What do butterflies, gates, cones, balls, and sleeves have in common?

They are all types of valves used to control the flow of water through pipelines.  Instead of our usual Photo Friday, we thought we’d take the time to honor this under- appreciated, but extremely important, feature in our water system.  For the record, a valve is a mechanical device that blocks a pipe either partially or completely to change the amount of fluid that passes through it. And we at the SFPUC couldn’t operate much in the Hetch Hetchy Regional Water System without them.

Here at the Calaveras Dam Replacement Project, we are installing all sorts of  valves to control the flow of water from Calaveras Reservoir for different purposes. Each valve is specially designed to control water in a specific way without damage to the surrounding pipeline. So, let’s geek out about valves!

Butterfly. A butterfly valve is a disk that sits in the middle of a pipe and swivels sideways (to admit fluid) or upright (to block the flow completely). It can also open partially to carefully calibrate the amount of water flowing through the pipe.

We are using a 48-inch diameter butterfly valve to control the flow of water to a temporary supply line for the Sunol Water Treatment Plant.

The Sleeve. The Bailey valve sleeve valve reduces water pressure and controls flow by diverting the water through multiple holes located within the sleeve and discharging to the atmosphere or a body of water. The valve controls flow by sliding one pipe called the gate over another pipe called the sleeve.

One of the Bailey sleeve valves installed in the building that will provide a steady stream of water to Calaveras Creek.

The Ball. In a ball valve, a hollowed-out sphere (the ball) sits tightly inside a pipe, completely blocking the fluid flow. When you turn the handle, it makes the ball swivel through ninety degrees, allowing the fluid to flow through the middle of it.  

These serve a similar purpose as the butterfly valve to calibrate the amount of flow.

The Cone. The body of the fixed cone valve is a tube with a cone in the end welded with some grooves.  Another tube acts as the closure member. This slides over the body groves in a linear movement to regulate until making contact against the seat of the cone when the valve is fully closed. 

This valve is not unlike your bathroom faucet, only in our case, a whole lot larger.

The fixed cone valve is used to discharge water at high pressure from reservoirs or full pipes into the atmosphere.  The flow towards the exit of the valve is not converging so that the discharge is in the shape of a hollow jet. 

The fixed cone valve at Calaveras Dam in operation January 2017.

The Gate. Gate valves open and close pipes by lowering metal gates across them. Most valves of this kind are designed to be either fully open or fully closed. Meaning, unlike the butterfly or ball valves, gate valves tend not to provide controlled flows of water, but either turn the flow completely on or completely off.

Two of the gate valves installed in the water supply discharge line from Calaveras Reservoir.

See you around the Valley!

Spring Wildflower Festival Draws Crowds to Sunol Regional Wilderness

This past weekend, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC) joined an estimated 1,000 attendees at the 2017 Spring Wildflower Festival, hosted by the East Bay Regional Park District.

The beautiful sunshine, wildflower blooms, nature hikes, and live music drew families from all over the Bay Area to Sunol Regional Wilderness. Over 300 kids stopped at the SFPUC resource booth to create their very own personal paw print necklaces while staff shared information to residents about our Sunol Valley projects underway including the Sunol Yard upgrade, construction of the Fish Passage Facilities Project within Alameda Creek Watershed and the Calaveras Dam Replacement Project.

We hope that you were able to experience this awesome event and enjoy the wildflower season as much as our staff did. See you around Sunol Valley!

Join Us at the 2017 Sunol Wildflower Festival

It is wildflower season in the Sunol Valley! Come enjoy the wonderful blooming flowers at the annual Sunol Wildflower Festival hosted by our friends at the East Bay Regional Park District.

When:  Sunday, April 9, 2017 from 11am to 4pm
Where: Sunol Regional Wilderness, 1895 Geary Road, Sunol, CA
Cost:    Free admission ($5 parking)

The festival is a fun family day out.  Learn about watershed animals, wildflowers, and grasslands. Enjoy the beauties of spring in one of the East Bay Regional Park District’s crown jewels at the Sunol Regional Wilderness.

We at the SFPUC are looking forward to it. Stop by and visit us at our booth. Get the latest and greatest information on all of our ongoing projects. Flaunt your Alameda Creek Watershed knowledge and win a prize! Fun crafts for the kids. 

We hope you see you on April 9th where the wildflowers grow!


For more information about the festival, visit ebparks.org.

Spring at San Antonio Reservoir

Happy Photo Friday!

Anybody passing through the Sunol Valley these days can't help but notice that spring has sprung.  The hillsides are vibrant green. Wildflowers are starting to make their colorful appearance. 

And SFPUC Watershed Keeper Pat is out on the watershed, as usual. Today's Photo Friday is courtesy of Pat, who shared this early morning picture from San Antonio Reservoir.

Happy Spring, Everyone!

Photo Friday From the Fish Passage Project on Alameda Creek

Happy Photo Friday, Everyone!

Ever wonder what a fish ladder looks like from the inside?

You are about to find out, courtesy of our Fish Passage Facilities within the Alameda Creek Watershed Project. The project's goal is to support the restoration of steelhead trout to the Southern Alameda Creek Watershed by building a fish ladder around the SFPUC's Alameda Creek Diversion Dam, in addition to other fish-friendly improvements on the structure.  

Construction is expected to be complete in fall 2018.

Workers pouring a concrete slab for the Fish Ladder.

A member of the construction crew examines the rebar to reinforce the fish ladder.

Celebrating Amazing Women Near You

Just this week, we celebrated International Women’s Day on March 8^th. March is also the beginning of National Women's History Month. In honor of the contributions of hard-working women everywhere, we wanted to highlight a few fabulous women who happen to work at the Calaveras Dam Replacement Project whose daily contributions ensure the success of this critical project. 

Eunice Lee, Field Engineer, Sukut Construction

As an alumna of the UC Irvine Civil Engineering program, Eunice has been working on heavy civil construction projects since 2010.  As part of the contractor’s team, Eunice is a field engineer who specifically oversees the installation of geotechnical instrumentation and the permanent power system for the future replacement dam.  Eunice truly enjoys being a part of this team working with so many experts and experienced individuals to build something great. 

Karene Salaam, Project Controls Analyst, Black and Veatch

Staff who make important contributions to the project don’t always work in the field. We have a team of people whose task it is to track project costs and spending. On a job the size of the Calaveras Dam Replacement Project, this is no simple task. Karene Salaam is part of the Construction Management team and oversees the preparation of cost reports, progress charts, manpower plans, equipment and material costs and project schedules.  Her careful review and analysis ensures the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission has close financial oversight of all project spending by the construction contractor and the subcontractors.

Carrie Dovzak, Geologist, Environmental and Naturally Occurring Asbestos Compliance Monitor, San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC)

Carrie Dovzak has worked for the SFPUC for 10 years, the last 6 1/2 of it working on Sunol Valley projects. It is Carrie's job to monitor construction activities to ensure compliance with environmental regulations and protections. She studied geology after traveling the world with her family - a perk of her father working for Pan American Airlines. After graduating, she mapped landslides in Northern Italy before returning to the U.S. to join her family. She continued her studies in Engineering Geology and Environmental Education at San Jose State and Hayward State. "Everyone should take a few classes in geology, you see the world in a completely different way!" she insists.

Ritu Gyawali Giri, Senior Engineer, Piping and Pipeline, Sukut Construction

Ritu Gyawali Giri is part of the outlet works team. She and her team focus on the new piping and pipelines that allow the SFPUC to take water out of the reservoir to our customers. She began in the construction industry in 2002, as a Site Engineer in Nepal. She has worked on projects all over the world, from Asia to Africa to the United States. Ritu relishes working through the geographical and environmental challenges to build the new Calaveras Dam. She is delighted to be a woman engineer working at the Calaveras Dam Replacement Project.