Brunel University London’s watertight Legionella management plan has won national recognition for the second year running at one of the UK’s leading water safety conferences.
Legionella pneumophila, which causes Legionnaires’ disease, and other water-borne pathogens such as Pseudomonas are tricky for large organisations to handle.
The bacteria thrive in lukewarm temperatures in systems where water isn’t treated in the same way as drinking water, such as in heating and cooling systems and in humidifiers. So water must be stored at either a low enough temperature to make the bacteria inactive, or high enough to kill them.
Brunel’s plan – the result of decades of hard work and expertise – scooped the award at the H&V News Indoor Air Quality & Water Safety 2017 conference, which joins the 2016 prize in the Estates department’s trophy cabinet.
“This is a great win for us and a credit to the team,” commented David Bannister, Director of Estates.
“The task of controlling water quality for 13,000 water outlets on the campus is a huge and complicated challenge that is managed by the Chief Engineer Bobbie Osborn and his team. Winning two awards in a row shows how committed they are to ensuring all residents and visitors to Brunel are protected."
Brunel’s Legionella expertise extends to its Institute of Environment, Health and Societies, with Dr Edwin Routledge a co-author on recent research which recommended improvements to global guidelines aimed at minimising the risk of contracting Legionnaires’ disease.
Image, left to right: Bob Stiff, Brunel University London’s Energy and Sustainability Manager, celebrating with Chief Engineer Bobbie Osborn.
Reported by:
Joe Buchanunn,
Media Relations
joe.buchanunn@brunel.ac.uk