Hydro runs a multidisciplinary R&D program designed to expand the company's reach in the stormwater, wastewater and combined sewer overflow industries.  The three-part program consists of computer modeling with computational fluid dynamics (CFD), laboratory analysis and field verification.

Research Facilities

Hydro conducts laboratory research out of its facilities in Clevedon, England and Portland, Maine, USA. 

The Portland facility is the Hydro Group's centre for Water Quality analysis.  This world class facility has the capacity to evaluate full-scale equipment at treatment flows in excess of 170 l/s  (6 cfs). 

The Clevedon facility is the centre for the Group's Water Quantity research. This facility is equipped with the most sophisticated flow measuring equipment that delivers accurate readings under the most turbulent of conditions.

Computational Fluid Dynamics

Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) plays an important role in Hydro's customer service and R&D programme.  In addition to furthering Hydro's level of customer service and aiding the R&D programme, Hydro also uses its CFD expertise to advise leading regulatory agencies, industry experts and academic institutions in the stormwater and wastewater industries.  

Hydro's researchers use CFD to evaluate and compare the performance of potential new product configurations.  Hydro also applies CFD to projects with unusually complicated flow schemes in order to alleviate the risks of cavitation or uneven flow loading.

Hydro has become an internationally recognized expert in CFD technology.  Through the use of CFD, Hydro was the first to uncover and demonstrate pollutant washout in stormwater treatment chambers - the phenomenon by which intense runoff flows cause enough turbulence to wash previously captured pollutants back into the water course.   

Many of the technical papers authored by Hydro International's researchers have used CFD to predict and validate the performance of the company's innovative technologies.