Steampower pumping stations for polders and collection and transport systems

In a previous contribution to Flevolands Geheugen about driving devices for the discharge of polders, I focused primarily on the introduction of steam-powered discharge for polders. This time, more about the pumping stations themselves and their application for the discharge of excess water from polders and collection and transport systems.

Steampower engines for the discharge of excess water from polders and collection and transport systems were primarily used in the second half of the 19^th century. Some well-known examples include the Cruquius, Leeghwater, and Lijnden pumping stations for the draining of the Haarlemmermeer from 1848 to 1852, and the discharge from the Haarlemmermeer Polder. In connection with the discharge, the steampower pumping stations at Spaarndam (1846) and Halfweg (1852) were also built at that time to discharge excess water from the collection and transport system of Rijnland, which was considerably reduced in size by the draining of the Haarlemmermeer.

The largest steampower pumping station in the Netherlands is the Ir. D.F. Wouda pumping station near Lemmer, for the discharge of excess water from the collection and transport system of Friesland, which was completed in 1920. This pumping station is still operational and can be deployed during extremely wet periods. Since 1998, the pumping station has been on the UNESCO World Heritage List.

In addition to their use in the draining of the Haarlemmermeer, steampower pumping stations were also deployed in the draining of a number of other drained lakes. Initially, this was done in combination with windmills, such as during the reclamation of the Zuidplas Polder (1828-1840). As I described earlier, the Polder of Nootdorp (1840-1844) was the first polder that was drained by using only a steampower pumping station. In a number of polders, steampower pumping stations replaced discharge by windmills.

The pumping capacity applied in steampower pumping in polders typically amounted to 8 millimetres per day, calculated over the area of the polder. In a number of polders, higher capacities were applied, up to even more than 25 millimetres per day. This was often necessary due to strong seepage. In a number of smaller polders, it was likely the case that the already small machine resulted in a high capacity in millimetres per day.

The introduction of steampower pumping made it possible to maintain lower water levels in the polders even in winter. Five editions of the water management maps (Waterstaatskaarten) in the Netherlands have been published, approximately once every thirty years. The first edition dates from the period 1860–1870. Only the summer water levels are listed on this edition, because when the land was drained by windmills, it was often waterlogged or even under water in winter. Consequently, the second edition of the Waterstaatskaarten, dating from the end of the 19^th century, includes the winter water levels, which were often about twenty centimetres lower than the summer water levels.

For the purpose of discharge of excess water from polders, a number of types of steam engines have been applied, including direct-acting horizontal steam engines, single-acting balance engines, horizontal compound engines, tandem compound engines, and double-acting steam engines according to the system of James Sims.

In connection with the discussions preceding the draining of the Haarlemmermeer, the report by Simons and Greve, Verhandelingen over de stoombemaling van polders en droogmakerijen (1844), played an important role. In it, they provided a detailed treatise on the advantages and disadvantages of various types of steam engines. Based on this, they concluded:

"That for water grinding, high-pressure steam engines with expansion and concentration of steam, or so-called Cornish steam engines, are most efficient; that these must be of double action if they are to be applied to paddle wheels and Archimedes screws; that those of single action, on the other hand, are preferred if pumps can be used."

In his book Polders en droogmakerijen (1909), Beekman stated that single-cylinder steam engines were usually used in steampower pumping stations until about 1880. Ligtenberg (1925) wrote that water-tube boilers were used for larger pumping operations at the end of the 19^th century and the beginning of the 20^th century.

The efficiency of a steampower pumping station was understood to be the ratio of the power delivered by the lifting device to the power of the driving device. The efficiency differed for all types of lifting devices and depended strongly on, among other things, the lifting height and the capacity. Every steampower pumping station had the highest efficiency at a certain lifting height, capacity, and rotational speed of the lifting device. Favourable values for the driving device at the time of steampower pumping were 0.80-0.90, for the lifting device 0.60-0.85, and for the transmission 0.9, so that the total efficiency could amount to 0.50-0.75.

The capacity of steampower pumping stations was typically expressed in water horsepower, where 1 water horsepower was the power to lift 75 litres of water 1 metre in 1 second.

With regard to available capacity, in addition to the power to be delivered by the machines, the time required to start the machines, the time needed for cleaning, and operation were of importance. For steam engines, it could initially take 10–30 hours before they were ready for operation. The water-tube boilers that were used later required barely an hour and a half to be put into operation.

It was also important that the boilers of steam engines had to be cleaned once a week, so that approximately 25 working days per month were available for discharge. If additional boilers were installed, cleaning did not need to cause downtime. In this regard, Simons and Greve assumed for the Haarlemmermeer Polder that there was at least one extra boiler, thereby eliminating the reason for forced downtime, and ensuring that 30 working days per month were available, especially during severely wet periods. According to Boer and Kielman (1956), when using steam engines, in small polders operated by a single person, the number of pumping hours could not exceed 18 hours per day.

Regarding the lifting devices used in steampower pumping, the most notable were suction pumps, suction pressure pumps, and centrifugal pumps. Suction pumps were used in horizontal and vertical configurations. They could be single-acting or double-acting. Huet noted that suction pumps offered the simplest solution for lifting large quantities of water to a maximum height of 10 metres. By far the most important application of suction pumps was for the steampower pumping of the Haarlemmermeer Polder. In my opinion, the best-known example of the application of suction pressure pumps was during the draining of the Prins Alexander Polder (1865–1874).

In the first half of the 20^th century, steampower pumping stations were replaced primarily by diesel and electric pumping stations. By now, most pumping stations are electric.