Desalination & Reuse Handbook - Flipbook - Page 87
FEATURED SMART LEAKAGE REDUCTION PROJECTS
Featured Smart Leakage Reduction Projects
RIYADH, SAUDI ARABIA: NETWORK
SECTORISATION AND NRW REDUCTION
The Leakage Reduction Project awarded to Aqualia by Saudi Arabia’s
National Water Company (NWC) in 2011 aimed to reduce physical
and commercial water losses in the city through the installation of
150 network sectors, equipped with boundary valves and flowmeters.
Three years in, the 2014 Riyadh Master Plan pushed the two
organisations to expand their activities, yielding results in a country
increasingly recognised for its application of smart technologies to
non-revenue water (NRW) reduction.
The launch of the Riyadh Supply Network Development Project
drove the expansion of network upgrade works, with a redoubled
focus on enhancing the city’s water supply and NRW management.
The project took on three strands of works: enhanced sectorisation
and creation of an accurate hydraulic model, installation of flow and
pressure meters, and integration of data collection into the city’s
SCADA (supervisory control and data acquisition) system.
The first strand of the project saw Aqualia divide the city’s network
into 34 mega-sectors – sealed areas supplied via inlets providing
water from storage tanks or conveyance pipelines – which would
allow NWC to gather, analyse and act on network data. These sectors
– also known as district metered areas (DMAs) – allow for leaks to be
inferred by analysing quantities of water entering and exiting each
mega-sector. These works involved the installation or replacement of
103 boundary valves. Emphasis was placed on minimising the impact
of replacement works on water service, with work on smaller valves
often taking place without reducing pressure in the network.
The second strand of works enhanced NWC’s ability to collect data
on the Riyadh water network. Aqualia installed 362 flowmeters and
100 pressure gauges across the network over a three-month period,
with insertion flowmeters situated at DMA entry and exit points,
and pressure gauges located at points of exceptionally high and low
Location
Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Client
National Water Company
Network upgrade contractor
FCC Aqualia
Network upgrade services
Sectorisation
Leakage detection
NRW reduction
Connections served
(network total)
480,000
Network length (total)
14,700 km
Connections surveyed
190,000
Network length surveyed
7,200 km
Pressure loggers
100
Insertion flowmeters (measuring
both pressure and flow)
362
Sensor supplier
(pressure and flow)
Halma Water Management
District metered areas (DMAs) in the
Riyadh water distribution network
Source: Aqualia
pressure. Insertion flowmeters were installed without interrupting
service in the network, and made-to-measure manholes were used to
facilitate a 12-hour turnaround for installation.
The third strand of the project involved the integration of data
obtained from flowmeters and pressure gauges into NWC’s SCADA
system. The flowmeters take flow and pressure readings, while
pressure gauges measure only pressure, resulting in 362 signals for
flow and 462 for pressure. The devices are equipped with VPN sim
cards, and transmit data readings every 5 minutes over NWC’s private
communications network. Aggregated data is stored in NWC’s server
and is transferred to the utility’s SCADA system every 15 minutes.
The combination of network sectorisation, sensor installation and
data integration in a single network upgrade project allowed NWC to
rapidly enhance their ability to collect, interpret and act on NRWrelated data. At the same time, the detailed hydraulic model that
Aqualia and NWC created over the course of network sectorisation
filled in key gaps in the client’s understanding of its distribution
network – a problem shared by utilities worldwide. Without this
foundation, there is limited scope to contextualise large volumes of
data to inform meaningful action.
As is the case with many utilities looking to ‘go digital’, integration
of data from multiple sources remains a challenge. After considering
the BuntBrain leak detection software used elsewhere by Aqualia,
NWC decided to stop short of transferring this level of decision
making to an artificial intelligence-based platform. Instead, the utility
takes regular readings of selected flowmeters in order to compare
the water balance in the network’s 34 mega-sectors with metered
consumption of subscribers. Insights gained from this data can be
used to inform further network maintenance to ensure prioritisation
of sectors with the highest rates of NRW. Proceeding sector by sector,
the benefits of enhanced NRW reduction are spread across the
network by redirecting the resulting excess supply to sectors seeing
shortages. The remainder of the 462 installed sensors continue to
transmit data, ready to be drawn on as NWC’s digital know-how
expands.
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