2015 Project of The Year- Rehabilitation Runner Up: Newport Beach Water Relining

Newport Beach Force Main Rehabilitation Phase I

In February 2014, the Orange County Sanitation District (OCSD) needed to upgrade or replace two fully deteriorated force mains in Newport Beach, Calif. More than 50 years old, the existing steel pipes range in diameters from 30 to 36 in. and have pressure ratings of more than 10 psi.

The OCSD Newport Beach rehabilitation project is part of a larger project for OCSD with Kiewit as the general contractor. The rehabilitation part of the project is divided into two phases as it deals with twin sections of pipe that run alongside the Pacific Coast Highway, stretching past Dover Drive to 61st Street in the City of Newport Beach. One sewer line is located on the north side of the Pacific Coast Highway and one on the south side. This project focuses on the first completed phase. Phase II is set to be completed sometime in 2016.

The Newport Beach Force Main is a critical component of OCSD’s collections system. It serves an area of approximately 15,000 acres in the City of Newport Beach and a small portion of Costa Mesa. In addition, the system includes four pump stations and a dual barrel force main along Pacific Coast Highway extending from the Bay Bridge pump station to the Bitter Point pump station — a distance of more than 14,000 lf. Sewer flows from the service area enter the pump stations and is then pumped to the Huntington Beach Wastewater Treatment facility through the Newport Force Main system. The goal of this particular project was not only to rehabilitate this component of the collection system but also extend the life of the sewer lines by another 50 years.



For Phase I of the project, Insituform rehabilitated 7,719 lf of 36-in. force main on the northern side of the freeway and 697 lf of 30-in. force main on the southern side of the highway. Later, 655 lf of a 24-in. siphon was added to the scope of the project. This project was broken out into 13 separate installations, ranging in length from just 170 lf to more than 1,000 ft. Five of the installations were more than 900 ft, with the longest measuring at 1,013 lf. This is one of the longest fiber-reinforced CIPP lengths ever installed for a pressurized 36-in. force main, according to Aegion, Insituform’s parent company.

The project was completed using Insituform’s RPP system. The RPP system uses a fiber-reinforced cured-in-place pipe (CIPP) product to provide added strength, stiffness and pressure capabilities to traditional CIPP. Fiber-reinforced products are becoming more common in the industry in the rehabilitation of smaller diameter pressure lines. However, at 30 and 36 in. in diameter, the Newport Beach project marks one of the larger-diameter CIPP pressure installations.

Phase II of the project is set to include 1,230 lf of 36-in. pipeline and 4,700 lf of 30-in. pipeline on the northern side of Pacific Coast Highway.

The location of the pipelines presented numerous challenges. At 14,346 lf, the project spans roughly more than 2.7 miles of highway. Located along both the north and south sides of the Pacific Coast Highway in Southern California, the pipeline ran between tight corridors — very close to the beach and high-end automobile dealerships. Not only was the location a challenge, but the combination of pressure, capacity, length and diameter also required a unique solution. In order to meet the pressure and diameter needs of the project while still operating in a busy and constricted location, the client chose the fiber-reinforced Insituform RPP due to its ability to meet the strict jobsite footprint requirements and cause less disruption. Due to site constraints, some of the pit locations were roughly 1,000 ft apart. This meant longer installation runs for the fiber-reinforced product. The pressure CIPP rehabilitation solution was able to meet all project requirements and be successfully installed, with installation lengths upward of 1,000 lf, while working within the jobsite limitations.

The project is one of the largest, if not the largest, pressure pipe CIPP rehabilitation projects for Aegion and the industry as a whole. The high-profile site location, Newport Beach and Pacific Coast Highway, is very busy with tourism-related traffic. There are multiple stakeholders to the project including the City of Newport Beach, OCSD, Kiewit, Insituform and Insituform subcontractors, Houston Harris and Propipe.

Due to the location of the site, project scope and the multiple stakeholders involved, the project was very challenging and had to be accurately estimated, properly planned and closely managed to ensure all aspects of the job went according to plan. With a great team, an experienced crew and excellent communication with the stakeholders, Insituform was able to complete Phase I of the project within the client’s requested schedule and budget with zero safety incidents and a high-quality product outcome on all segments.