Water Innovations gives Water and Wastewater Engineers and end-users a venue to find project solutions and source valuable product information. We aim to educate the engineering and operations community on important issues and trends.
Issue link: http://wateronline.epubxp.com/i/716370
By Michael Sullivan and Carey Hidaka W ater is a precious resource, often taken for granted in some parts of the world, while other regions struggle with life-threatening scarcity. Water conservation is a critical aspect of sustainability in communities worldwide, and smart technology can often be found at the forefront of transformative change and improvement. Our planet is becoming smarter: The growth in the adoption of instrumentation, widespread system interconnectivity, and intelligence through Big Data are enabling the creation of "cognitive" systems that combine processing of all types of data with machine learning to improve the world around us. This cognitive era is opening up new avenues for communities and businesses to improve operations and act more responsibly when it comes to sustainability by making it easier to sort through all the complexity and improving engagement across the entire value chain. Even organizations that have not been traditionally consumer-focused are seeing more connectivity and engagement with their end users. In this cognitive world, systems such as water, energy, and transportation are progressively becoming more dependent upon understanding and encouraging positive behavior by end consumers. And by understanding what drives individual behavior organizations can tap this powerful potential to become more proactive, using data as the driver to provide new operational insights, predict problems before they occur, and operate more efficiently. For water and wastewater utilities, these steps help to improve vital water systems globally and address industry challenges associated with aging and failing infrastructure, drought, water quality deterioration, and an aging and retiring workforce. Making The Case For Measuring Usage Smart metering solutions can automate the collection and transport of meter information, allowing utilities to extract meaningful customer usage data to understand actual resource usage. For example, during times of stress on the distribution system, advanced meter management can be an important source of data to read meters rapidly and more frequently to gain a better understanding of customers' usage and make informed decisions about operations during times of high demand or shortages. Advanced meter infrastructure can also help utilities: • Improve reliability and response time to address pressures from regulatory bodies and the market. • Increase workforce productivity and safety by automating tasks and limiting the amount of onsite work required. • Identify and locate outages quickly to speed time to response. • Improve resource planning. • Motivate customers to limit resource usage. • Enable time-based billing to help reduce peaks, reward customers for off-peak use, and provide incentives to reduce peak consumption. • Facilitate a more interactive relationship with utility consumers by enabling home area networking. • Enhance operational awareness throughout the energy value chain, providing significant operational and planning benefits. Smart metering also allows utilities to realize significant operational efficiencies and cost savings. Smart meters can automate certain time-consuming maintenance requests and minimize field meter work orders, which can reduce operating costs over a range of activities such as meter reading, distribution system maintenance, and managing against system failures. Advantages Of Data Analysis Smart meters no longer just measure consumption — and they are not an isolated system to themselves. Today, they are complementing a variety of novel sensing technologies and being woven into the Internet of Things to drive new insights. Beyond the obvious benefit of cost efficiency, meter data can be analyzed to understand usage consumption and detect anomalies such as leaks, malfunctioning of meters, or theft. After introducing specific meter data, utilities can quickly identify leaks and immediately intervene, giving them the upper hand to reduce water loss, cost of refunds and legal expenses, and offer improved quality of service. Additionally, low consumption alerts can help detect theft or meter faults. Perhaps most importantly, alerts for abnormal usage in the public and private sectors can reduce careless water usage in places such as schools, sports centers, hospitals, and municipality-owned institutions, which help utilities and individuals play an active role in monitoring water usage and consumption, thereby bringing awareness to the scarcity of water. 34 wateronline.com n Water Innovations Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) Brings More Reliable Water Operations Clearly Into Focus Learn about the advantages and implementation of AMI from experts who are making "smarter water" a reality.