Lab scientist wins Seal prize

Visitors to the SEAL Analytical stand at WWEM 2014 were entered into a competition to win an iPad mini, and SEAL has announced that the lucky winner is Chris Bevan, an assistant scientist at Anglian Water’s wastewater laboratory near Huntingdon. Presenting Chris with his prize, SEAL’s Natalie Barton said: “WWEM 2014 was a highly successful event for us, providing an ideal opportunity to launch the new AQ400 automated discrete analyser.

“A broad spectrum of visitors entered the competition and we were delighted when Chris won, because Anglian Water has been a longstanding customer of ours.”

Natalie presented the prize during a routine service visit to the Huntingdon lab during which she serviced three SEAL AQ2 Discrete Analysers. These analysers were installed in May 2014 and now run around 300 samples per day for ammonium, nitrite, nitrate, chlorine and reactive phosphate.

Anglian Water’s wastewater laboratory handles samples from a large area in the east of England, stretching from Grimsby to Basildon and from Daventry to Great Yarmouth, providing data for both regulatory and process control purposes.

Chris Bevan has worked in the Anglian Water laboratory for over nine years. During this time, he has operated an older discrete analyser model, the AQUA. Commenting on the advantages of the new AQ2 systems, Chris says: “These instruments are more automated than the AQUA, and require significantly less time to operate. As a result, around 75% of the workload is in progress by 11am which frees me to work elsewhere in the lab – on BOD, TSS, COD and FOG for example.

“Following a suggestion from SEAL, we are currently looking at dedicating one of the AQ2’s to ammonium. In doing so, we will fit a 100 position sample wheel to cope with the higher capacity needed.”