Case Study: AQUADVANCED® Water Supply
The real-time water management features of AQUADVANCED® Water Supply (formerly known as AQUADVANCED® Energy) helped Bristol Water achieve record low energy consumption and improve network optimisation.
Issue
Serving Bristol and beyond, Bristol Water provides water to 1.2 million customers. The supply area covers 2,400 sq. km. providing a daily average of 264 million litres of drinking water along 6,700km of pipe mains.
In recent years, Bristol Water increased its resilience and interconnectivity between sources and supply areas. It is complex to fully optimise the operation due to the broad impact and ever-changing needs; trying to reduce cost whilst maintaining resilient supply under pressures such as drought.
Wanting to boost operational efficiency, the utility had several goals – reducing energy consumption and costs, streamlining water routes for efficiency and cost-savings, improving asset efficiency, and overall consistent network optimisation.
Solution
Bristol Water approached SUEZ to implement AQUADVANCED® Water Supply across the entire water distribution network. AQUADVANCED® is a real-time water management and optimisation system that works alongside SCADA and telemetry systems, and it helps water utilities save energy by:
- Forecasting water demand in different zones and scheduling delivery at the lowest cost
- Pumping water to storage tanks during low-cost energy periods and releasing it during high-cost periods
- Using the most efficient way to move water around the network
- Selecting the most efficient pumps and pump combinations based on flow rates
- Avoiding tariff peaks through Demand Charge Management.
Differentiating factors
Among its biggest benefits, AQUADVANCED® Water Supply significantly enhances operations, while also reducing energy costs and minimising environmental impact. Since the technology automates many tasks that the controls team would otherwise have to do manually, it allows the team to let go of the mundane and focus on the strategic elements of their roles.
Unlike point-to-point optimisers which address issues or enhancements in isolation, AQUADVANCED® assesses operational efficiencies across entire networks and considers interactions between remote assets, thus giving an integrated approach to network optimisation.
Advantageously, AQUADVANCED® updates plans within 30 minutes, scheduling the next 48 hours (versus 24h offered by others). The control team always has the latest information to make informed decisions. This holistic approach to water management delivers impressive energy savings and ensures consistent, efficient operations, even when faced with unexpected changes in demand.
The results
Having the power to analyse a full year’s worth of energy demand data allowed AQUADVANCED® Water Supply to tailor energy packages to perfectly match Bristol Water’s specific needs. One of these needs was to simplify water transport from all sources effectively and economically.
This data-driven approach has produced remarkable results. Bristol Water saw an 8% reduction in energy consumption, the lowest for Bristol Water in 20 years.
One advantage of AQUADVANCED® Water Supply is its efficient way of managing a consistent water supply, especially during periods of high demand. It played a significant role in Bristol Water’s supply strategy. It helped the company intelligently limit drought sensitive sources moving water across the network from sources with more available water. Thanks to this strategic approach, Bristol Water has been able to maintain normal operations and provide its customers with a reliable water supply.
The future
Bristol Water has gone beyond the initial scope by incorporating additional assets into their network, such as on-site generation. Interestingly, although certain pump stations may not provide significant financial savings, they remain in the software for other benefits, such as improved water quality and resilience.
AQUADVANCED® empowers Bristol Water to adapt to evolving network operations and seize opportunities as they arise.
