RALEIGH, NC, AUG 13, 2018 -- Just 30 miles northwest of Atlanta, the City of Dallas, Georgia, offers a reprieve from the busyness of the big city with the retained charm of simpler times and a friendly community. While the city might have an easygoing appeal, running the local water utility is anything but a breeze. The utility team's constant goal is to deliver superior service for the city's 14,000 residents.
"We've built high standards for our services based on the city's tradition of community and growth," said City of Dallas Billing Clerk Amber Whisner.
After analyzing annual water loss audits for the city, Whisner and her team discovered significant issues around non-revenue water. The audit results spurred Whisner and her team to create a robust water loss and control program. As part of the program, the city turned to Sensus, a Xylem brand, to replace its existing water meters with a system that could more efficiently identify issues to help minimize non-revenue water.
"We discovered that a large percentage of our water was simply being lost, so it was a problem we couldn't ignore," said Whisner. "When you're a paid utility that purchases its water from the county, every drop counts."
The city replaced approximately 320 meters in one subdivision, choosing Sensus iPERL® residential water meters for the project. Offering low-flow accuracy and high-flow durability, the iPERL uses innovative magnetic technology to capture previously unmeasured low flow.
"The iPERL water meter picked up flow data we never had before," said Whisner. "The meters could register the smallest bit of water usage for activities like the flushing of toilets or the washing of hands."
In just four months, the city billed for an additional 600,000 gallons of water in the subdivision thanks to the Sensus meters. Based on the success of the rollout, the utility is now deploying a Sensus advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) solution across its entire service area.
