EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND -- An Edinburgh science hub has a new helping hand – a-state-of-the art automated robot which is being used to test water quality.
The benchtop robot has been installed at Scottish Water’s Juniper House laboratory in Currie.
It is used by the utility’s Scientific Services department which carries out a range of vital tests on all of the country’s drinking water. Specialists in its Inorganics team work every day to check the pH, colour, turbidity and conductivity of water.
The tests are carried out on water taken from customer taps, reservoirs, water treatment works, swimming pools and private water supplies.
The work was previously carried out on a machine called a Peerless Auto Analyser, which was coming to the end of its user life. Although effective it took up a large space in the relatively small labs and also needed large volumes of samples (meaning bigger bottles) and chemicals for tests to be carried out.
Anna Figueras Carril of Scottish Water said: “We wanted a more compact and reliable piece of equipment and, ideally one with bigger capacity to sample and test different waters. When we came across the robots we knew they ticked every box.
“Increasing customer demand – in terms of growing and changing populations and tighter water quality regulations - means we are carrying out more tests on drinking water than ever, over 500 tests per day. Drinking water regulations are increasingly more stringent, meaning that Scottish Water has to test samples more often to ensure that the quality of our water is never compromised.
“The robots mean we will have much less wastage in terms of water and chemicals needed for testing and also a reduction in plastic, as we will be able to use smaller sample bottles. This will all help Scottish Water get a step closer to its net zero emissions target by 2040.
