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4 May 2013updated 26 Sep 2015 1:46pm

“Mega-canal” proposal distributed in Government

Canal running from Pennines to London would transport goods, power and water.

By Alex Hern

Aecom, an American professional services company, has proposed construction of a “mega-canal” running from the Scottish borders to London. The canal, which would cost £14bn to create, be 24m wide and run alongside a high-voltage power cable, is intended to provide solutions to future issues with water supply, power transmission and sustainable transport.

Yesterday, Construction Manager magazine reported that the proposal was implicitly supported by DECC’s scientific adviser David McKay, who distributed copies to to officials at the BIS, Defra and the Department for Transport, and describes the reasoning behind it:

The canal would help to mitigate any future drought and also supply additional irrigation to the agricultural sector, by feeding Scottish water into existing waterways.

And as well as offering a sustainable alternative to road and rail freight, facilitating the movement of biomass fuel to the south, it could also carry High Voltage Direct Current (HVDC) cables in special compartments, with the water providing natural cooling.

Aecom’s associate director David Weight argues that there’s real hope for the proposal:

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“We think that unlike HS2, local authorities would be queuing up to have a canal going through their area. As for funding, we’d anticipate a multi-stakeholder approach. There are many organisations that could either save money by using the canal or extract a toll for others to use it — for instance Scottish Power, Scottish Water, the National Grid…

The canal would also be perfect for associated developments, such as eco-towns — the power and water are already there.

The proposal is an elegant – if rather brute-force – method of combining solutions to several problems facing Britain today. Unlike the Victorian Georgian age of canals, which were primarily built for transportation of goods, Aecom envisages a greater focus being on the transportation of water, from the pennines down to the drought-ridden South East. The transmission of goods would be only secondary – although with shipping being one of the most environmentally friendly methods of transport around, it’s not inconceivable that it could have a second wind.

Adding in transport of power on top, solving three problems in one, is also a very good idea. But despite that, this remains blue-sky thinking. The joined-up nature which is its greatest strength is also the single biggest reason why it’s unlikely to be implemented: as good as it is at solving a number of problems, it’s not likely to be the best method to solve any individual one. DECC would rather increase generation capacity; the DfT would rather focus on rails and roads; and Defra’s water strategy doesn’t envisage any large scale transport of water.

Instead, it’s best to look at the Aecom proposal as something between a wonderful highlight of how low we now aim with our mega-projects, and porn for infrastructure geeks. With a little bit of steampunk thrown in for good measure, too – now, how about those zeppelins?

Update: @BorisWatch points out I have got my ages of canals wrong. By the time Victoria was on the throne, the railway boom had all but killed canals.

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