Proactive pump maintenance success: How Xylem supported Yorkshire Water achieve a 51% reduction in reactive visits

Insights from a Xylem and Yorkshire Water partnership success that has led to 51% reduction in reactive pumping station visits will be shared during an online innovation showcase.   

Facilitated by Spring Innovation, the event takes place on 18 February 2025. It will explore Yorkshire Water’s Dynamic Asset Maintenance Programme, which has enabled the company to take a proactive approach to pump maintenance, resulting in fewer blockages and pollutions, as well as a 13% reduction in energy consumption.  

Yorkshire Water covers one of the largest areas in England and one of the key challenges of its network of wastewater pumping stations was pump blockages. When these issues arise, they require reactive, time-consuming visits from a utility’s operations and maintenance team, which incur significant costs in fuel, time, resources and disruption to residents.  

Yorkshire Water required an easily deployable solution that delivered tangible benefits across the network. After partnering with Xylem, nearly 1,000 new pumps have been installed at 500 Yorkshire Water sites, including the innovative Flygt Concertor® solution, selected due to its proven clog resilience, pump cleaning capabilities and simple connectivity. 

The Spring showcase will be hosted by members of the project team Simon Herrington, programme manager, Yorkshire Water, Andrew Welsh, utilities director, Xylem and Jason Robinson, account manager, Xylem.

It will include a case study of the programme’s initial trial at a problematic site which required two to three visits a week, due to clogging. Since installation of two Concertor pumps in January 2019 there have been zero blockages recorded, meaning that reactive visits to site for this issue were completely avoided. 

Welsh said: “This successful partnership with Yorkshire Water has resulted in fewer pump blockages, pollution incidents and reactive visits. It has also reduced the whole lifecycle cost of energy and equipment and improved asset lifespan.  

“These will all be key focus areas for water companies over the next five years and we are looking forward to sharing lessons at the Spring online showcase.” 

Daniel McQuail, business development manager at Spring Innovation, said: “Spring’s knowledge-sharing showcases provide the wider sector with the opportunity to hear directly from Xylem, Yorkshire Water, and other project partners in an in-depth exploration of the project.

“Speakers will share key objectives, insights, lessons learned - both successes and challenges - and adoption recommendations.

"The true value of Spring showcases lies in the real-world learnings from each project. Our speakers will offer firsthand experiences from the Xylem-Yorkshire Water partnership, demonstrating how the Flygt Concertor solution is driving tangible improvements for operations teams.

“Join us to explore a proactive, preventative approach to tackling blockages and pollution. Hear directly from the project team about key outcomes so far and the new developments planned for AMP8.”

The Xylem-Yorkshire Water online showcase, facilitated by Spring Innovation, will take place on 18 February 2025 at 10am-12noon. Register on the Spring website to learn more about how to take a more proactive and preventative approach toblockages and pollution Events - Spring Innovation  

About Xylem
Xylem (XYL) is a Fortune 500 global water solutions company that empowers customers and communities to build a more water-secure world. Our 23,000 diverse employees delivered combined pro forma revenue of $8.1 billion in 2023, optimizing water and resource management with innovation and expertise. Join us at www.xylem.com and Let’s Solve Water.

^{Source: Xylem Water Solutions UK}