WATER
Remote cellular pressure monitoring system gives utility greater confidence By Chris Polk
M
ost water utilities monitor their physical plants – tanks, pump stations, treatment plants, etc. – but there is much more data that can be captured in a distribution system. Unless they use remote cellular pressure sensors, water personnel have to travel to sites to manually gather pressure information with gauges or other short time span recording devices. This methodology not only takes valuable time, but only provides a snapshot of what is occurring in the system. Initially, one water utility, with close to 800 km of water mains, 26,000 metered connections and 26 full-time employees, wanted to record water pressures without having to visit locations routinely to check these using static water pressure gauges on hydrants and faucets. “Our plan was to install two Mueller Hydro-Guard® remote pressure monitoring sensors as a trial. One sensor was strategically placed to monitor a specific area’s pressure; the second was placed in one of our pressure zones to see what data it would actually provide us,” said
The Mueller IWT interface allows operators to see data uploaded from the sensors.
Jeff Elrod, water distribution manager. One advantage of the sensors is that they can be installed anywhere. The first sensor was installed directly into the water main, using a corporation stop fitting in an area where they did not have a vacant meter setter. The second sen-
sor was installed in a high priority area that conveniently had a vacant customer connection available. Flow tests were then performed in areas monitored by the sensors to simulate different levels of water loss due to a variety of water main break scenarios.
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24 | December 2018
Environmental Science & Engineering Magazine
