EMR helps Longford County Council to reduce energy consumption at the town’s waste water treatment works
Leading SCADA and instrumentation provider, EMR Integrated Solutions today announced it has secured a contract to provide real-time monitoring of the energy consumption at Longford Town Waste Water Treatment Works. The new system allows Longford Water Services to better understand how, when and where energy is consumed while having the ability to also assess the quality of the incoming supply.
The initial system comprises of multi-channel power monitors providing information on performance at equipment level as well as at the incoming supplies.
Although Longford is the fourth smallest of the 32 counties in area (1,091km2) and second smallest in terms of population (38,970), Longford County Council have been active in investigating ways to reduce energy consumption.
Commenting on the project, Padraig Farrell of Longford County Council said:
“EMR demonstrated a strong comprehension of our outline requirements and have delivered a feature rich solution. The system has greatly improved our ability to see what’s happening on our plants in relation to better operation and energy consumption.”
Through the calculation of EPIs (economic performance indicators) EMR could demonstrate how each item of monitored equipment was performing. This insight allows Longford to use the better performing equipment while identifying equipment needing attention.
A secure Ethernet wireless 2.4GHz IEEE 802.11g/b LAN with 128bit WEP and WPA encryption was created on site to retrieve process data from including flows and dissolved oxygen levels for the calculation of the EPIs without the requirement for additional cabling. Encryption of this wireless network was sufficient to form part of the Longford County WAN.
With the addition of SCADA, the energy information retrieved is combined with process data and presented in customized reports relating energy loads to unit costs, time, equipment efficiency, control methods and environmental factors. The reports are emailed automatically to relevant personnel, eliminating any requirement to retrieve data manually and are now being reviewed by production and accounts departments on a monthly basis. Based on these reports, better work practices are being implemented/tested relating to how and when energy is consumed and associated cost reductions achieved.
