Lower Colorado River Authority

The Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA) is a state agency in central Texas that provides wholesale water and energy to cooperatives and communities. The agency expanded from hydra-generation capabilities into electric power distribution to help meet the demands of the growing state.

Challenges

LCRA’s wholesale water division was interested in testing the cost effectiveness of a wholly automated remote monitoring solution to read bulk water meter distribution points. They enlisted engineers to develop a pilot program at two community locations in order to eliminate manual data collection. The purpose of the meter automation project was twofold: accurate measurement of water quantities delivered to each customer and real-time monitoring of water flow to identify potential issues before any incidents occur.

To obtain the actual number of gallons of water delivered to wholesale customers, an employee must visually inspect mechanical metering devices that are inside underground utility vaults – a process both time-consuming and dangerous. To eliminate the need for a time-intensive site visits, the LCRA has leveraged a cellular data solution with broad enough coverage to match its water distribution network.

Solution

LCRA’s cellular provider recommended upgrading to the Sierra Wireless AirLink™ Raven gateways to advance the connectivity and remote monitoring capabilities of its pilot program. At critical junctions in the water network, the LCRA has automated data loggers that dynamically track water flow. The LCRA uses the rugged AirLink Ravens to access the data from the meters. The data is sent to a central office server, where it can be analyzed for water flow tracking and predictive analysis to identify potential issues.

The Raven gateway is a robust communications platform for telemetry and SCADA that simplifies management of remote assets. Powered by ALEOS™ embedded intelligence and managed by AirLink management software, the Raven enables remote configuration and troubleshooting, virtually eliminating service calls to remote equipment, resulting in a quick ROI.

LCRA discovered that one of the biggest advantages of deploying a cellular data solution with intelligent AirLink gateways was it didn’t require the replacement of legacy equipment; the AirLink cellular devices integrated very well with LCRA’s existing monitoring equipment, saving the authority an enormous amount of time and investment for the system upgrade.

“The devices just flat out worked,” explained Andy Verrett, senior systems technician at LCRA.

With minimal capital investment, LCRA was able to advance the remote monitoring of its infrastructure and the thousands of gallons of water per unit flowing within. The Sierra Wireless Raven cellular gateways also provided the following benefits:

• Uninterrupted connectivity for access to critical water level and usage data
• Increased productivity and safety for field staff collecting meter head readings
• Seamless integration with existing monitoring equipment
• Improved customer satisfaction through accurate billing of water usage