Invest now in the future of #SmartWater
Industry leaders are increasingly using the innovation of smart technology to enhance their efforts in water and wastewater management, seeing incredible outcomes as a result. Countries such as Singapore and South Korea lead the way in setting the pace for the future of the sector, employing solutions like Edge Computing, IOT and Real-Time data analytics to measure, understand and optimise usage of the world’s most valuable asset: water. However, the rest of the region must catch-up and reinvent current practices to future-proof their water management solutions.
In the last of our three-part series, we explore why it is important for the rest of the world to investigate the opportunities posed by smart water.
Albert Tam (Lead Solutions Architect at Stratus Technologies) spoke to us about current happenings in the sector and the opportunities he sees: “It is time for a refresh of existing infrastructure and technology. Leaders are starting to look to more Cloud and Edge solutions. But the question is how are they going to shift their mindsets and address current systems to make full use of the innovation available?”
The paradigm shift is happening now: a gap is opening for global leaders to bring their smart solutions to market, offering Asia the innovation it needs to revolutionise the sector.
Albert highlights that within the water sector, the urgency to innovate is pressing because “water is a critical part of the public infrastructure and demands a very high up-time. So, it’s essential that the leaders in the water and wastewater industry ensure infrastructure, at its very core, is future-proof. It really isn’t there yet.”
There are three key areas underpinning any nation’s water system which need to be taken into account:
Providing clean water for commercial use. Water usage varies across different countries and regions. For example, the non-domestic sector in Singapore uses about 55% of its current water supply, which is projected to increase to 70% by 2060. Additionally, Singapore’s per capita household water consumption is currently around 143 litres per day.
Water management in city infrastructure. Depending on the location, water management data centres can be subject to flood risk, temperature extremes, and earthquakes. In remote or detached treatment facilities, technology elements need to run as hands-free as possible. Spreading data sites out geographically can allow operations to switch to another location without a moment’s outage.
Sustainable management of water in agriculture. Good management is critical to increase agricultural production, reduce water pollution from agriculture, and ensure water can be shared with other users while maintaining the environmental and social benefits of water systems. Governments need to improve water management systems to improve water resource use efficiency and manage pollution. As you can see, the sector deals with large and complex issues, with many individual components that require always-on technology.
Albert elaborates on the smart water trend: “We’re talking about an industry that traditionally has relied solely on PLC devices – they’re designed to do just one thing, turn something on or off based on an input. Now, faced with powerful instruments that can process much larger amounts of data, they really have to find ways to equip themselves with the right processes to make full use of these.”
The key to innovation is in partnerships
To help the water sector in Asia get to where it needs to be, global leaders can offer much in the way of tools through strategic partnerships. The main goal is to help the region’s water management systems achieve the ideal of “always-on” in both functionality and data.
This is an area where Stratus actively partners with companies and government authorities to help develop a competitive edge through reliability, simplicity and overall cost-effectiveness.
Shanghai Disney Resort, the newest and largest Disney theme park in Asia, takes no chances. Disney’s critical water system is run on Stratus’ continuous availability solutions. Stratus built the core infrastructure of Shanghai Disney Resort’s water treatment system on the innovation of Stratus ftServer. Intelligent, self-healing ftServer prevents unplanned downtime, so the park’s critical systems run continuously with no data loss.
Mr. Pang, Shanghai Disney Resort’s chief engineer, explains, “We can count on the Stratus ftServer solution to eliminate single points of technical failure, so this critical system runs continuously—without unscheduled interruptions.” This translates to low total cost of ownership and high return on investment. For Shanghai Disney Resort, that return is best demonstrated by the delight and safety of tens of thousands of visitors that enjoy its vast facility every day.
Another key partnership is Hangzhou Jiuxi Water Plant, in China’s Zhejiang Province. The water plant deployed the ftServer system in August 2017 and has realised significant operational efficiency gains. The platform’s seamless virtualisation support has enabled the company to improve system infrastructure, reduce energy consumption, ensure minimal downtime and network disruption, and save valuable space within its control centre. The ftServer has also increased SCADA application performance, reliability, and data stability. This has allowed our client to remain on the edge, while acting as a backbone to ensuring safe and reliable water to Zhejiang’s citizens.
The opportunity is there for global leaders to make similar strong partnerships within the region.
Moving forward, when exploring the future of water and wastewater management systems in Asia, leaders should consider Asia’s growing population and its requirement for future-proofing systems with “always-on” solutions. Although Singapore and South Korea set a high standard, other countries are yet to develop suitable infrastructure. With increased demand, global leaders will only benefit from bringing their solutions to the region and investing in the future of the sector.
The question is: how confident are you with your edge computing solutions for the future of water and wastewater management?
Make sure you are edge ready and don’t get left behind.
