First Flovac Project in Denmark, Hages Badehotel (Beach Hotel)
Flovac’s first project in Denmark is linked wih Denmark’s largest infrastructure project and the world’s longest immersed tunnel. The Fehmarnbelt. The land used for the Hotel and housing project has come from the earth excavated from the tunnel project.
The project is located on the island of Lolland and the tunnel will connect Lolland with the German island of Fehmarn. It was vitally important for the developer Lidsøparken A/S and the architect Miami Ark to create a project that would fit in with the natural beauty of the area, looking after the birdlife and unique plant life. It was decided at an early stage that a vacuum sewerage system would be the only collection system suitable to meet all environmental criteria with low energy use and low impact.
STEEL ApS, who had some previous experience with vacuum systems decided in 2021 to enter a long-term relationship with Flovac, to use Flovac’s vacuum valves and equipment throughout Denmark.
The project’s first stage is a vacuum station and several collection pits servicing a restaurant and 72 houses with 124 apartments. The area is covered with reeds, small lakes with a clay soil and a high ground water table. The second and third stages will include a further 134 holiday houses and a luxury glamping area.
The Hages Badehotel and housing is built on stilts with the idea that this would create the least amount of impact on the land. And that in 100 years the development could be closed and there would be no sign of any impact on the area. This is another reason why a Flovac system was chosen.
General Manager of the project, Ruurd Van Putten, gave us his insight. “It’s a unique project in Vietnam that will ignite a whole new industry. Yachting is generally known for its high standard, quality and innovation. Marinas have proven to be a catalyst for economic growth, development of tourism and overall improvement of leisure services and facilities.
With environmental concerns a high priority in coastal developments, Ana Marina is heavily focused on the key concepts of Sustainability, Durability and Responsibility. “A marina means less pollution, cleaner water, and protection to vulnerable marine life. It will have special systems to prevent spillage of oil, fuel and waste of boats.
Kampong Ayer in Brunei’s capital city of Bandar Seri Begawan is a cluster of around 40 small villages connected by a 38-kilometer (23-mile) boardwalk. It dates back more than 600 years. Today, around 13,000 people live in the water village, about 3{f2ac4d1e1d40dc2e2d9280a1dfa90d854b2d8c80eba743affa37fc4ce2e16def} of the country’s population.
Although some of the houses are now on vacuum sewer networks, many have still not been connected. Historically having raw sewerage drop into the water below only really affected the health of the local population as many of the water people swam or fished in the same water. With the wealth of those living in the villages increasing, more problems have surfaced with detergents entering the waterways, killing off the fish and other local seafood. None of this is good for tourism, especially the odour.
The pipework sloping to a gravity main below the houses close to the surface of the water was cut many times by local residents as it was impeding the way that many residents got around the area in their boats. For hundreds of years the residents drove their small boats under their houses and around the village. All of a sudden plastic pipes were in the way. A simple solution – cut them.
As the pipework was laid directly under the walkways it was not visible and did not impact on the passage of the residents. The number one lesson for residents was to learn not to use their toilet as a rubbish bin. Initially blockages were common and operators grew frustrated by the number of items thrown into the system. The problem residents were easily found as with only 4 houses connected to a sump, the process of elimination was easy and the residents were educated as to proper use. Modern valve monitoring systems will make this even easier.
If you are part of a coastal community it could be worse, your old broken pipes could be letting seawater into the system every time there is a high tide or major storm. Salt water can cause major problems at the Treatment Plant. For communities like Miami Beach who get storm surges flooding their sewers and closing their beach on an increasingly regular basis it can cause major economic and health risks. Santa Pola in the Alicante area of Spain found that the impact of global warming and rising sea levels caused a complete failure of their old sewer system.
The town of Santa Pola with over 10,000 homes replaced their whole gravity sewer system with a Flovac vacuum sewerage system. As vacuum mains are laid in shallow trenches it was possible to skirt around, above and below exiting infrastructure and eventually replace the network. 
When looking at upgrading a gravity sewer, pipe relining can be an option, but in many cases this becomes an ongoing expensive option and be too difficult in a large network. Some utilities just look to replace the old pipework, but in most communities this is just not practical. This could mean uprooted gardens, roads out of use for a number of months, noise, dust and a huge cost.
Flovac vacuum sewers have shown time and again, their versatility. This means either their ability to handle density changes or climate changes. It might even mean changes in ground conditions as happened in Christchurch New Zealand when they suffered from a terrible earthquake. The old gravity sewers in the city and surrounding suburbs broke and left residents with no service for months. Vacuum sewers have now replaced a large portion of the gravity sewers in Christchurch and although difficult has proved to be a better long term solution for the residents and operators. 
As the project was quite remote Flovac supplied a containerized plug and play vacuum pump station and treatment plant. All water on the island is supplied by a desalination plant, so water is precious and spared as much as possible. Treatment quality is very important so that this pristine area is not polluted in any way.
neighborhood complete with a Foodstuffs supermarket, cafe’s and restaurants. Already built is a large BP service station which houses a cafe and a Jetwash. The Flovac system handles the commercial premises and can handle any flows from the car washing facility.