Water Efficiency May 2012 : Page 16
desired, what the technology demands, and what utility value the customers can support.” One of the biggest challenges is dealing with data, Sala says. “If you look at the smallest water utility of 10,000 points, when you do the math and fi gure they went from monthly reads to the now-standard hourly reads—and there’s been requests for 15-minute data—you start to realize this is getting into an area for types of databases and structures where you just can’t fl ip the switch and not pay any at-tention to it,” he says. “AMI systems are very demanding from a data footprint perspective. We have the ability to move some of the intelligence out to the end of the network to reduce the need to manage all of that data at the back offi ce while still gaining the benefi ts of highly detailed sampling.” Th e reason most utilities typically want 15-minute data isn’t specifi c to water profi ling analysis as much as targeted end-point monitoring activi-ties like leaks and backfl ows, “because 15-minute intervals with high resolu-tion is critical to accurately do that kind of monitoring,” says Sala. “You’re not however going to be able to eff ectively use 15-minute data to identify a dish-washer versus a washing machine or anything unique like they are striving for in the electric industry.” Neptune also is focusing on more process automation within the system. “When the system detects condi-tions such as backfl ows being picked up in the distribution network by leak sensors, it’s automatically generating investigations to other the water utility systems as opposed to simply producing a report that no one runs or looks at and nothing ever happens,” says Sala. Neptune favors a STAR network topology approach, Sala says. “It comes down to ease of de-ployment,” he says. “You can analyze and do the propagation up-front and anticipate the way the network is going to perform much more readily before you start deploying it. You also put less technology out in the fi eld, which is a major issue for water utilities because they are already very resource-strapped. Sala points out that if a utility cannot do its own analysis of what could easily 16 WATER EFFICIENCY WWW.WATEREFFICIENCY.NET be many millions, or even billions, of records created by 15-minute data inter-vals, it quickly loses the value of having all that data backhauled, so his company advocates the use of its E-Coder to elimi-nate that heavy lift ing by the utility. “We believe resolution is critical,” he says. “We’ve seen utilities putting in AMI systems and low-resolution encod-ers or pulse generators. Th ey have all of this data, but it’s very low resolution, so now they don’t get any actionable METERING AND IRRIGATION CONTROL Chris Spain, Chief Strategy Officer, HydroPoint Data Systems, says his company is named for purpose of realizing efficiency and conserva-tion for customers through better analytics and data for water. “The water network is a complex system with interrelated parts—supply, usage, and treatment,” adds Spain. “Understandably, the focus has been on supply and treatment, such as public health reasons. But end use repre-sents a huge opportunity to aff ect the two other segments. You get signifi cantly reduced water waste and water runoff with the end use component. You can materially reduce the need for supply and waste treatment on the other two sides of the segment.” That creates an “economic and green benefi t” for the water agency, the environ-ment, and end users, he points out. That will be critical in coming years to address the weather extremes being pre-dicted due to climate change. “Technology is going to have to re-spond,” says Spain. “There’s a glimmer of hope in regards to meeting these constraints and challenges in the proliferation of relatively inexpensive wireless communication systems and advanced data systems and being able to adjust and gather data in real time. The ability of complex analytics off ers the real vision about how we’re going to get ourselves out of this mess.” Such technology addresses the low-hanging fruit for conservation against the backdrop of water waste, Spain says, adding his company’s system can save up to 45% of water use. It has about a two-year payback, off ering end users to meet economic require-ments as well as “green” benefi ts, he says. Through a program called Smart Yard, HydroPoint Data Systems pairs with water agencies, which fi nance the cost of installa-tion and services interest-free over a fi ve-year period so a customer’s water bill is lower than the savings, with the fee placed on the water bill. Local businesses do the installation and inspections, and customers who won’t be sav-ing as much are fi ltered out of the program. “When we looked at the whole urban water use spectrum, we saw that outdoor water use was a huge area of waste, but for us it was just the beginning of what we would call the smart water grid—something that is intelligent, two-way, and provides two simple value propositions: visibility and control,” he says. The company created WeatherTRAK ET plus for residential use in response to the need to curb water waste in the outdoor space. “It calculates how much you irrigate based on highest-resolution weather data that we send to the controller,” he says. The second component was gathering the data onsite and transferring it wirelessly to a dash-board, giving customers the ability to monitor what’s happening in real time so they can respond accordingly. “This process—similar to smart grids in general AMI or AMR systems—is surprising in what we didn’t know once we start looking at where the real waste issues are through the process of real-time visibility,” says Spain. HydroPoint Data System’s smart irriga-tion controller is often coupled with a high-resolution weather analytic solution, which calculates about eight million data points a day to calculate evapotranspiration data down to 1 square kilometer, Spain says. “If you don’t know what the weather is, you don’t know what the proper water func-tion should be,” says Spain. Spain points out that water possesses a number of “interesting” components. “It is an essential component for industrial production and everyday use,” he says. “It has an unbelievable ability to cause profound damages when it’s leaking and uncontrolled. It’s such a powerful resource, and the quicker you can respond to these leaks and breaks, the more intelligent you can be about saving money. “There are some interesting reports coming out, like from Frost & Sullivan, which says that 20% of water users will be on some kind of smart water grid by 2020,” he contin-ues. “They believe water utilities can save 30% on utility bills moving to smart grid technol-ogy. That’s pretty impressive, considering 60% of their costs are energy-related.”
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