The 7 Key Technologies to Succeed with an Online Centralized Management System in Water Management Applications
The 1st consideration in Directive 2000/60/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council states that “Water is not a commercial commodity like the others, but a heritage which must be protected, ...
The 1st consideration in Directive 2000/60/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council states that “Water is not a commercial commodity like the others, but a heritage which must be protected, defended and treated as such”
Projects in the water sector are usually long-term operating businesses with risks in the return on investments and regulatory restrictions. An online centralized management system will help companies optimize the use of their assets by reducing operating and energy costs, making it easier for regulatory Agencies and Entities to have the knowledge necessary to meet their inspection and control objectives for supply and sanitation services.
The Centralized Management System is the instrument that allows the Agencies to have information from all the plants it manages, with reliable information (without manual intervention, validatable), secure (without data loss, without the possibility of manipulation), in a simple and economically sustainable way and in time.
The latest generation of Information and Communication Technologies allows data to be collected directly from the sensors and instrumentation of the plants and to offer the data (inlet and outlet flows, turbidity, conductivity, etc…) automatically to a SCADA system for its subsequent exploitation.
The management of the information received from the plants provides us with numerous advantages, among which we can highlight:
- Reduction of energy consumption and emissions by applying savings policies and strategies.
- Control of production with information on inlet and outlet flows as well as waste produced.
- Adapt to regulations by having parameters of the quality of water returned to the channel.
- Reduction of downtime and its associated costs by having real-time fault information, so we can react quickly.
- We will improve preventive maintenance tasks since we can even anticipate equipment failure.
Having a centralized management system will allow us to remotely control the facilities from anywhere, even with mobile operations, which clearly reduces operating costs and reduces reaction times.
One of the key points in the design of an online centralized management system is the selection of appropriate control and telecommunications technologies and architectures and the development of a master plan with clear and measurable objectives. Among these technologies we can highlight those corresponding to the following areas:
- Selection of equipment for control and data acquisition.
- Analyze alternatives for telecommunications.
- Select a SCADA platform that covers our needs.
