LWT Acquires Innovative Material Systems (IMS); Dredges Enhance Water Supply for Orange County (California, USA) Water District

March, 2003 - LWT Acquires Innovative Material Systems (IMS)

LWT announced that it has acquired the operating assets of IMS, best known for its patented Starwheel drive self-propulsion system.  IMS was the Kansas "Exporter of the Year" in 2000, and has sold over 250 auger dredges since its inception in 1986.

Jim Horton will continue as President of the IMS Division of LWT.  He can be reached at 913-642-5100 or toll free 866-467-4010.

Horton announced that Jackson County, MO has just ordered a 7012 Model Versi-dredge with Starwheel for lake sediment removal.

LWT also announced that Martin E. Barnes, Jr., previously a member of the Board of Directors of LWT, has joined LWT full time as President.  Barnes has over 20 years' experience in the dredge manufacturing field. Barnes stated that among his priorities will be expanded outreach to all existing LWT and IMS dredge owners for after-sales parts and customer service.

IMS will operate as an autonomous unit of LWT.  IMS intends to continue selling the complete IMS auger dredge and pump product line, which it sees as serving a distinct customer base from the LWT automated dredge products serving primarily waste water treatment plants and industrial lagoons.  Click here for the IMS product line.

For more information on IMS, contact:
Jim Horton
Ph:  913-642-5100 or toll free 866-467-4010
Fax:  913-642-5119
Email:  Jim Horton

In other LWT news, the Orange County Water District (OCWD) has selected LWT dredges for a project to add to its water capacity for California's parched consumers.

OCWD provides over 2 million people with their water from groundwater reserves which are maintained by a recharge system, replacing water pumped from wells. OCWD's facilities have a recharge capacity of approximately 300,000 acre-feet per year.

Along a six-mile section of the Santa Ana River that belongs to OCWD, a system of diversion structures and recharge basins captures most of the water that would otherwise flow into the Pacific Ocean.  The current average annual base flow of the Santa Ana River is approximately 140,000 acre-feet. Storm flows add up to 500,000 acre-feet. The base flow is projected to increase by 100,000 acre-feet over the next 20 years due to urban development in upstream areas.  The soil along this stretch of the Santa Ana River is coarse-grained and sandy so water readily percolates into ground water aquifers.

The recharge basins gradually accumulate a thin layer of fine sediments and biological material that slows or even stops percolation. Although the percolation rate in a newly cleaned deep basin can reach 10 feet per day, the rate can drop to nearly zero after six to eight months.

The OCWD's new LWT dredges, to be called “Basin Cleaning Vehicles,”  will maintain and restore the percolation rate by precisely removing this thin layer of organic sediment. OCWD chose LWT because its proposal for fully automated dredges "was the best of six received, and based on LWT dredges' wide use, simplicity, and applicability."  The $2.5MM project will be completed in 2003.

The Gulf Coast Waste Disposal Authority (GCA), a political subdivision of the State of Texas, has ordered a Pit Hog™ Model 738XW Auger Dredge from LWT.

The contract is for the purchase, delivery, setup and training of a completely self-propelled, manned floating dredge system suitable for removal and conveyance of solids, sand, and sludge from the 40 Acre Facility Facultative Basins #2 and #3 that have a combined volume of approximately 700,000 cubic yards.  This will be the second dredge bought from LWT this year.

GCA's four industrial WWTP's handle the waste water from 60 manufacturing plants (mostly petrochemical) in three Texas counties around Galveston Bay and Houston.

LWT's United Marine International Division has received orders for a trash skimmer for the Port of Houston's Buffalo Bayou Channel, and for a weed harvester from a customer in China.

LWT now has a record backlog including half a dozen other projects not mentioned above.