Photo courtesy: Itron.
How citizens and municipalities are saving water
By Henrique Costa
Approximately 70 percent of the earth’s surface is water, and yet it’s sobering to note that only 1 percent of the world’s water is fresh water. On this 49th annual Earth Day -- with its golden anniversary just over the horizon -- it’s comforting to know that citizens and municipalities alike have the means of conserving water. But the commitment to water conservation must be there, too.
Continued increases in demand, growing populations, and a rapid increase in droughts are putting pressure on individuals to use water more responsibly. City after city report that residents have lowered their usage during regional droughts. And individuals on their own have proven that they can quickly identify and fix leaks, such as a leaky toilet, which can waste up to 50 gallons of water a day.
What’s tougher is the challenges to agencies and utilities, which must contend with aging delivery systems and leaking infrastructures that can take years to rearchitect or renovate. According to The New York Times, by 2020, the average American “pipeline” will be 45 years old, and some pipelines have been in the ground for up to 150 years. Corrosion and lead contamination are just a couple of the attendant risks.
And water losses are reaching new highs. In 2015 the state of California reported than an estimated 350,000 acre-feet of treated drinking water -- approximately 114,048,000,000 gallons -- was going to waste each year. Even more dire are water losses from drought, which have no immediate or even eventual solution. A 2014 study involving seven western states -- Arizona, Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, California, New Mexico and Nevada -- found that underground water loss was responsible for three-quarters of cumulative water loss over a 14-year period starting in 2000.
Harvesting Water Usage Data
Notwithstanding unpreventable water losses, agencies are now deploying Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) to detect, predict, and prevent water losses. AMI is an integrated system of smart meters, communications networks, and data management systems that enables two-way communication between utilities and customers. AMI encompasses the full measurement and collection system that includes meters at the customer site, communication networks between the customer and a service provider, and data reception and management systems that make the information available to the service provider.
AMI makes it possible to collect large amounts of data associated with managing meters and measuring customer consumption. This allows utilities to monitor the integrity of distribution systems and track consumer compliance with conservation initiatives. And data and analytics play a role, too. Data creates awareness, and from awareness comes action. Actions can have an impact on how a utility services its customers, how those customers consume a resource, and how that resource can be sustained.
