Sherwin-Williams Announces 2021 Water & Wastewater Impact Award Winners

CLEVELAND, OHIO (June 1, 2022) – The project team braving tight quarters, steep vertical drops and an aggressive coatings schedule to reline an 8- to 9.5-foot-diameter, 1.3-mile-long penstock for the Devil Canyon Powerplant in San Bernardino, California, has earned top honors in the 2021 Sherwin-Williams Impact Award program. The Impact Award recognizes exceptional projects that feature high-performance coating and lining materials from Sherwin-Williams Protective & Marine. The challenging, multi-year project involved blasting and relining the penstock’s entire interior while navigating grades of nearly 75% in spots, figuring out how to manage equipment access via 30-inch wide entry points located 1,000 feet apart and maintaining warmth inside the pipeline when outside temperatures were near freezing and winds occasionally reached 70 mph. The winning team includes the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) and industrial services firm Unified Field Services Corporation.

A similar endeavor The runner-up project for the 2021 awards realized major savings in the restoration of five surface water storage tanks for the City of Holyoke, Massachusetts. The project team of Holyoke Water Works, applicator Champion Painting Specialty Services Corporation and engineering firm Tighe & Bond worked with Sherwin-Williams to save more than half of the initial anticipated $2.2 million cost of restoring the tanks. The resulting $1.2 million savings was made possible by reassessing the tank’s conditions and opting for an overcoat system on four of the tanks instead of setting up full containment systems for each tank and dry blasting their surfaces down to bare metal. Only one tank required the full restoration treatment, saving the city precious budget dollars and enabling the restorations to take place over two years. 

The 2021 honorable mention project covered the restoration of an elevated water storage tank that celebrates iconic TV legend Andy Griffith. Serving Griffith’s hometown city of Mount Airy, North Carolina, the water tower boasts a logo featuring a pair of familiar silhouettes fishing – a scene reminiscent of the actor’s fictional TV hometown, The Andy Griffith Show’s Mayberry. Water tower maintenance contractor Southern Corrosion Inc. restored the tower’s exterior for the City of Mount Airy using an overcoat system that prevented the need to endure the higher costs and longer time associated with a complete rehabilitation. As the final step, the contractor retraced and filled in the iconic logo by hand, helping the city renew its highest tribute to Griffith.

“The 2021 Sherwin-Williams Impact Award winners faced a range of difficult challenges, while successfully overcoming them to extend the service lives of critical infrastructure assets. That’s the kind of dedication we look forward to honoring each year via the program,” said Bryan Draga, Global Vice President – Marketing, Sherwin-Williams Protective & Marine. “These winners have found optimal solutions to water and wastewater challenges that save time, labor and precious municipal budget dollars – not only in the execution of the coatings projects but also over the long term as these applied systems continue to prevent corrosion and enhance aesthetics.”

The Sherwin-Williams Impact Award program recognizes application contractors, specifiers and owners for excellence on North American water and wastewater projects that have a compelling effect on the industry with regard to public safety, asset protection and infrastructure life cycle improvement. Eligible projects included any water-related structure that was new, restored and/or rehabilitated in 2020 and was completed using coating and lining materials from Sherwin-Williams Protective & Marine.