US city plans to deploy smart water meters

Metering.com 19 MAY 2016

The US city of Berea in Ohio partnered with metering solutions company Badger Meter and metering firm NECO for the rollout of a smart water meters project.

Under the programme, the city will install some 4,000 Badger water meters with assistance from NECO to reduce non-revenue water through accurate water billing and leak detections.

According to a local publication, the city will begin installing the smart meters together with the communications infrastructure as from next week.

Commenting on the programme, Cyril Kleem, mayor of Berea city said: “Some meters in the city are 50 years old, they need to be replaced.”

The new system will allow the city water department to communicate with its consumers remotely on a daily basis unlike in the existing system whereby the city carried out meter reads on a quarterly basis.

“This will be more efficient for the Water Department,” added the mayor.

The programme comes into existence following the approval of a US$1.7m loan from the Ohio Water Development Authority for the city to upgrade its metering system.

However, since the loan is insufficient to cover the total costs of the whole project, the city said it will increase consumers’ quarterly water bills by US$6 to raise adequate funds for the full rollout of the project.

The city targets to have the 4,000 meters replaced before the end of the year.

Smart water meters in the US

Late March, US water utility Illinois American Water collaborated with power utility ComEd for the rollout of a smart water meter pilot.

Under the agreement, American Water is looking forward to better manage its distribution network by utilising ComEd’s smart grid network to transmit water data.

ComEd said the main aim of the project is to test the use of smart water meters on its network. [Global smart water metering market worth US$5.51bn by 2021].

The development followed ComEd’s lab test of its network’s ability to connect smart water meters at the Illinois Technology Centre for Smart Grid Application, Research and Technology (CSMART).

However, with American Water, the power utility serving 3,8m power consumers in Illinois will test network’s capability to transmit meter data of some 500 smart water meters.

Commenting on the partnership, Anne Pramaggiore, CEO of ComEd added: “Illinois is developing a powerful innovation ecosystem…”

Image credit: www.wwdmag.com.