Suminoe Pump Station

One of the largest pump stations in Osaka City

Pump Station Overview

Location: Suminoe-ku, Osaka
Discharge capacity: 73 m³/s
Number of units: 6
Type: Model-VLYGE 2200-mm diameter vertical mixed flow pump

Challenge/Solutions

As the city of Osaka grew, there were fewer fields, lakes and wetlands to retain rainwater. Whenever there was local heavy rainfall, rainwater exceeding the capacity of low-lying areas to handle it would concentrate in low-lying land, even in areas that had established sewerage systems, causing damaging floods. Urban flooding had become a serious problem in the south-eastern part of the city, prompting the construction of the Naniwa Grand Floodway. Suminoe Pump Station was built for the purpose of draining water collected in this floodway (total length of 12.2 km, maximum inside diameter of 6.5 m) into the Sumiyoshi River.

Features

Since the main line of the floodway into which rainwater flows is situated about 30 meters deep underground, most of this facility is an underground structure. To keep civil engineering and construction costs down and shorten the time needed for construction, the underground section was given a cylinder shape (outer diameter 81 meters). Six pumps installed in the facility work to drain water into the Sumiyoshi River.