Walking Thoughts

  Here’s a sharpened, scroll-stopping social media article that keeps your voice but lands with clarity, authority, and just enough edge to make people pause mid-scroll: “He must have eaten too many sweets.” No. Just… no. My child has Type 1 Diabetes. Not because of diet. Not because of parenting. Not because of anything I did or didn’t do. It’s an autoimmune disease. His pancreas doesn’t produce insulin. That’s it. That’s the whole story. And yet— the number of times I’ve been judged, blamed, or quietly assessed as “the mother who caused it”… is astonishing. Let me tell you what people don’t see. When people hear “diabetes”, many picture poor diet and excess weight. But one of the early warning signs of Type 1 is actually being  thinner . Another is  unquenchable thirst . So no— not the stereotype. Not even close. What people  really  don’t understand is what low blood sugar, hypoglycaemia, actually does. It doesn’t just mean “a bit shaky”. It means: • Confusio...

  CPD Summary – Transition to Project Management in Early-Stage Capital Delivery Over the past six months, I have transitioned from a process engineering role into a project management position within a solutions team responsible for early-stage capital delivery. This team develops investment solutions for water and wastewater treatment assets as part of a five-year business plan, focused on environmental protection and the provision of safe, clean drinking water. During this period, I have contributed to the development of phosphorus removal, nitrogen removal, and growth schemes with capital values ranging from £2 million to £11 million. This represents my first experience operating at this stage of the asset lifecycle, requiring integration of engineering, regulatory, commercial, and stakeholder considerations to define feasible and compliant solutions. A key area of professional development has been working on schemes designed to achieve a total nitrogen consent of 10 mg/L in fi...

  You’re absolutely right to challenge that. If a supplier draws a hard line at ~5 L/s DWF, it’s not marketing theatre, it’s physics, hydraulics, and a bit of commercial scar tissue from plants that didn’t behave. My earlier confidence wasn’t misplaced on  process capability , but it didn’t fully respect the  scale-dependent hydraulics . Let’s unpack that properly. 🔍 Why suppliers get nervous below ~5 L/s DWF At small flows, tertiary denitrifying filters stop behaving like elegant polishing units and start acting like temperamental houseplants 🌱 1. Hydraulic distribution breaks down Denitrifying sand filters rely on: Even flow distribution across the bed Stable loading rates At  low DWF (~<5 L/s) : Flow becomes  intermittent or channelised Parts of the bed go: Starved (no substrate) Or overfed (short-circuiting) 👉 Result: inconsistent denitrification, nitrate leakage 2. Backwash becomes disproportionate Backwashing is not optional. It’s the heartbeat. At s...

  Let’s treat this like a design room whiteboard session rather than a brochure. You’ve got a small works, cold wastewater, a tight-but-not-extreme TN target, and the luxury of space. That combination quietly changes everything. 🎯 Design context (decoded) Flow (FFT):  7 L/s ≈ 605 m³/d → small works Temperature:  8°C → nitrifiers move like they’re wearing winter coats TN consent:  10 mg/L → achievable, but not forgiving Carbon:  Available (methanol/acetic acid) → removes the biggest constraint Footprint:  Unlimited → you can trade land for simplicity and robustness 🧭 Decision matrix (tailored to your plant) Process Option TN Reliability @ 8°C CAPEX OPEX Operational Complexity Footprint Use Buildability Overall Suitability MLE (2-stage) Medium–High Low Medium Low Large Excellent ⭐⭐⭐⭐ MLE + tertiary denitrifying filter Very High Medium Medium–High (carbon) Medium Medium Excellent ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ A²/O (3-stage BNR) Medium Low–Medium Medium Medium Large Excellent ⭐⭐⭐ SB...

  You’re essentially asking a question every modern wastewater designer wrestles with:  how do we reliably push total nitrogen (TN) down to ~10 mg/L without building a gold-plated cathedral of steel and membranes? Short answer: it’s doable with several process families, but each pays its price in carbon, energy, footprint, or complexity. Below is a structured, engineer-to-engineer comparison. 1. Framing the target: TN ≈ 10 mg/L EU discharge standards commonly require  ≤10 mg/L TN  for large works ( ScienceDirect ) Conventional activated sludge often stabilises around  10–15 mg/L without optimisation  ( Frontiers ) Achieving  consistently <10 mg/L  typically requires: Optimised internal recycles Sufficient rbCOD or external carbon Tight DO control (SND or staged systems) Or polishing (filters, tertiary denitrification) Think of 10 mg/L as the boundary where “standard practice” becomes “precision engineering.” 2. Core process families (with compa...

  No it is not acceptable or professional   for a trainer to adopt a haughty voice or be rude to an employee, regardless of the situation surrounding the training. You can do everything right… and still be spoken to like you did everything wrong. Today, I experienced exactly that. I completed all the prerequisites to the best of my ability. And yet, As the photo I uploaded was of insufficient quality, it wasn’t enough. My employers contacted me to let me know. So I prioritise delivering work to the client and declined The now non-viable training. The employee was in a difficult position of being forced to choose between a, in this case, non-viable training session and a client deliverable. A good trainer would recognize these pressures rather than creating a hostile environment. I showed up prepared. I followed the process. I made a reasonable, professional decision in a situation with conflicting demands. According to standard professional conduct and training best practices,...

  Yesterday I was visiting a Water Recycling Centre in Norfolk, looking at process treatment options to remove excess nutrients from effluent before it returns to the watercourse. In other words, the quiet, methodical work that helps keep rivers healthy. Naturally, health and safety comes first. I was in full six-point PPE. Hard hat. Chin strap. Gloves. Boots. The works. Except… my helmet was on backwards. Chin strap fully fastened. Entirely compliant. Just facing the wrong direction. No one seemed terribly concerned, but it did get me thinking later in the early hours, as these things do, about perspective. I grew up with a blind father. Our house didn’t have mirrors in the bathroom because he didn’t need them. Lights weren’t particularly important either. When you grow up in that environment, you absorb a certain practical logic about the world. If something serves no purpose, you simply don’t install it. But of course, when you are trying to show something to someone else, the t...

  When I planted the wild cherry tree over my mother’s grave, I thought I was marking a place. Humans like places. A stone. A tree. A neat understanding that someone is  here  and not  there . Nature, however, tends to view such arrangements as helpful suggestions rather than binding agreements. Her tree grew. Trees do what trees do, which is to say they conduct a slow and extremely thorough conversation with the soil. Roots wander through the earth meeting minerals, worms, forgotten bottle caps, and eventually whatever remains of the person you loved. In time, the tree and my mother reached an arrangement. Now, every spring, Mum’s tree blossoms. When it does, the universe bends a little. Not dramatically. The laws of physics remain broadly intact. But small adjustments occur. Churches unexpectedly develop tea-making capabilities. Cake appears in places that had previously only specialised in solemnity. My son, whose diabetes has a very firm opinion about the availab...

  When my mother‘s cherry tree blossoms, the universe responds in unexpected ways: churches that had no intention of becoming cafés suddenly find themselves serving tea and cake.   Absolutely! Here’s a Pratchett-esque rewording of that thought: Whenever my mother’s cherry tree decides to blossom, the universe takes a polite but insistent cue. Suddenly, churches that had long prided themselves on solemnity and pews find themselves inexplicably serving tea and cake, as though the angels themselves were craving a scone and a small slice of serendipity. If you like, I can spin a slightly longer, whimsical version that stretches the idea across the village and the day, with little magical quirks happening everywhere in true Pratchett style. Do you want me to do that? Here’s a Pratchett-inspired, heartfelt version of your reflection for Facebook—blending whimsy, love, and magic with the themes you’ve shared: Tomorrow is Mother’s Day, and my thoughts are full of my mother, who in so ...