Sea-Lix smart water technology ensures stable water supply

About 1.2 billion people, or almost one-fifth of the world’s population, live in areas of water scarcity. By 2030, water shortage is expected to displace between 24 million and 700 million people due to the effects of climate change, causing shortages and droughts in some areas and floods in others. Meanwhile, the amount of energy used in the water sector is projected to more than double by 2040.

Water utilities face increasing pressure to provide good quality water. Many struggle with outdated infrastructure, which increases the risk of water leakage and contamination of drinking water. It is estimated that one-third of all water systems lose more than 40 per cent of the water produced due to ageing infrastructure and lack of monitoring of the distribution network.

Sea-Lix provides a portfolio of products that enable complete control and management of water distribution networks.

The company’s autonomous monitoring platform, POGMI/POGMO, gathers valuable data for operations, water quality and preventive maintenance. This data is fed into the Smart Utility Data Analytics platform (SUDA). Alerts and notifications are sent via an Internet of Things (IoT) interface.

Furthermore, Sea-Lix’s advanced pressure control turbine, POPCO, provides real-time pressure management, reducing pressure to optimal levels at any given point in time. It also makes use of an often wasted resource – excess pressure – to generate clean energy.

Integration of the Sea-Lix system gives operators a better understanding of what is occurring in water distribution networks, enabling them to sustainably manage the distribution and quality of drinking water.

The system alerts of any changes in conditions, indicating where a leak may occur and what requires maintenance. In this way it reduces the amount of leakage by 20 to 50 per cent as well as the frequency of new leakages. It also contributes to an overall reduction of energy use in the water sector.

Smart water management is rapidly gaining ground as it streamlines water utility operations and reduces energy consumption. The smart water management market is forecast to grow from USD 8.46 billion in 2016 to USD 20.1 billion by 2021.