Gilmerton dismantel explosive factory

The Ardeer peninsula in Ayrshire is a gigantic sand dune - it was chosen by Alfred Nobel in 1871 as the site for his British Dynamite Factory because of its remote location and vast amounts of sand to make protective berms and blast walls. It soon grew into the world’s largest explosives factory, making explosives for mining and quarrying, and expanding into other explosives and propellants for both civilian and military uses.

In 1926 Nobel Explosives became part of ICI (Imperial Chemical Industries) and production shifted away from Ardeer. So the factory diversified into other non-explosive products, but unfortunately these were not very successful – so a large part of the original site became derelict. However a small part of the factory still remains in operation today.

Gilmerton Land Services were awarded the contract to decommission the site.

Contract Requirements:

• Isolate and cap off 15 miles of underground water mains to reduce water leakages and to recover along with 20 miles of cable

• Mass demolition of substantial unsafe structures.

• To work independently of other contractors.

• Complete removal of all unsafe debris and demolition material.

The current factory (Chemring Energetics UK Ltd (CEUK)) operating on the site needed to be isolated in every respect from the derelict area. We were able to work alongside the factory efficiently and speedily with no interference to the daily activities.

Due to old piping in place significant water loss was occurring amounting to £1000s daily, this was resolved by capping off redundant sections of the pipelines and carried out with no interference of the operations in the factory

In addition:

• 200 disused manholes made safe all this resulted in no cost to the client but resulted in a credit of tens of thousands of pounds from the retrieved assets.

• Provision of an efficient clean-up of these unwanted services prior to redevelopment and environmental advantages to the site.