Water and Effluent Treatment Magazine
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16 WET NEWS MARCH 2017 Water network management is complex but accurate flow measurement plays across the spectrum of activities, says NEL's Alick MacGillivray. Optimising water supply network performance the smart way INSIGHT Flow & level monitoring I n the UK, water network management is a complex undertaking. In England and Wales alone, water companies manage a network of 335,000km of pipes, with around 24 million connections to homes and industrial properties. As a consequence, water and sewerage companies face a large range of challenges in the effective maintenance of their delivery networks. Every day in England and Wales, 3.3 billion litres of water are lost through leakage in the delivery networks. The scale of this problem is set to get worse since the UK population is projected to increase by nearly 15% over the next 25 years. This increase is predicted to be greater in areas that are already classed as water stressed such as London and the South-east. In addition to this, Environment Agency (EA) predictions show that water levels could drop by between 10% and 15% over the next few decades due to climate change. This represents a growing gap between what the industry can supply and what is required by customers. There are a range of other challenges facing the water industry in the UK. Many of the water pipes were installed many years ago and are now old and more prone to leakage. In response to this, over the years the industry has invested vast Water companies are obligated to perform an annual water balance calculation amounts of capital into its assets and infrastructure. A number of global trends are also having an effect on the water industry. Climate change is one of the most important of these. Water is currently perceived by the public as an inexhaustible resource that is cheap and always plentiful. The water industry must alter that perception as soon as possible because changes in rainfall patterns are likely to result in more regular infrastructure failure. Water companies have also got to manage changing customer expectations. It is a fact that customers are only aware of their water supply when something goes wrong. For example, if there is a hosepipe ban due to a water shortage, or when the supply is temporarily cut off. Customers' perceptions are also impacted when they are sent a substantially increased water bill caused by necessary ongoing investment in infrastructure, such as pipes and water meters. The industry has to manage customer behaviours to assist in driving innovation, which will particularly be the case in the future when there will be more elderly and potentially vulnerable customers. Like many sectors within engineering, there is pressure brought to bear by an ageing workforce, resulting in a shortage of key skills. This may mean a substantial investment in re-training to ensure that they have the skills required in the future. Along with all of this, water companies still have to meet the demands of the regulator. Water companies are obligated to perform an annual water balance calculation, which compares the water volume from sources of supply to that of the demand. There is also the SIM (Service Incentive Mechanism) score (out of 100) which is part of the regulatory process for setting the price and service package that each of the companies must deliver. Companies must publish these scores independently alongside other information about their performance. With this range of array of challenges facing it, the industry is being driven to adopt new technologies and protocols to make the most of the resources that they have at their disposal. Principal amongst these are smart metering and the application data reconciliation techniques. Smart metering Smart meters measure and transmit a customer's water usage data to supply companies. They can operate on their own or as part of a wireless network, transferring readings periodically from pipes connected to an individual property using a range of different technologies, so that both the customer and the provider can monitor the amount of water being used by the household. They are o'en referred to as AMI (Advanced Metering Infrastructure) in that the meter can transmit data to the water company and also receive data from it. This removes the need for staff to have to physically check, or to inspect the meter, reducing the cost of maintenance. There are several types of • The amount of water lost through leakage is set to get worse as the population increases