Combating Drought with Advanced Metering Tech

Aclara®, a leader in smart infrastructure technology for water, gas and electric utilities, leads the fight against the drought with solutions that give utilities the tools they need to control water use and find leaks both inside and outside homes

"Utilities in California are looking hard at using technology to control water use. When smart systems like Aclara's are installed on water meters, utilities better understand where and how water is used. They have the information they need to help consumers reduce their usage in accordance with conservation mandates," said Allan Connolly, president and CEO of Aclara.

"What's more, in many communities, 10 to 30 percent of water pumped into distribution systems is lost due to leaks before it even reaches the customer. From an environmental perspective, this situation wastes a great deal of water and contributes to what utilities call 'non-revenue water.' Aclara systems can detect and locate small underground leaks before they become major problems," added Connolly.

San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC) is one of the largest utilities in the California to install Aclara's STAR® network for reading meters hourly. The data collected from the city's 180,000 meters by Aclara's two-way fixed network powers the utility's system for letting customers track usage online. Aclara also generates a report that allows the utility to identify customers who may have leaks inside their homes.

The utility reaches out to those who show up on the report by sending weekly postcards notifying them of a possible leak. It monitors the reports and notes which accounts have come off the list, assuming that they have responded to the utility's notice and fixed the leak. Future enhancements to the report may benefit commercial customers and those owning multifamily residences such as apartment buildings.

In addition to analyzing meter readings to identify potential leaks, most of Aclara's California customers are looking hard at installing its STAR® ZoneScan system, which allows utilities to pinpoint underground leaks. Aclara has deployed the technology in a number of East Coast communities such as Sylacauga, Ala., which uses the system to find underground leaks that occur on hundreds of miles of galvanized service lines and cast-iron pipes.

The Aclara STAR ZoneScan system was one of the tools that helped Sylacauga reduce its non-revenue water losses from about 34 percent to 23 percent.

Source: PRNewsWire

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• Metering
• Metering Technologies
• Smart Metering (AMI)