Tracking water usage at Sutton Bonington
New submeters at Sutton Bonington are monitoring water consumption and helping to detect water leaks earlier.
The University uses over 2 million litres of water every day, delivered through its own network of underground water pipes at each of the major campuses. Unfortunately, water leakage is inevitable on large sites with aging underground pipe systems, and may account for as much as a third of annual usage.
Whilst large ‘bursts’ of water mains are usually immediately apparent due to subsidence or a loss of local water pressure, smaller leaks may go undetected for months or even years.
To help with early detection of leaks, Estate Office Surveyors installed twelve major submeters on the internal water distribution network at Sutton Bonington in the spring of 2013.
Radio transmitters enable remote data collection and are connected to the Sustainability team’s Elcomponent submetering system. The system records water usage at each meter every half-hour and is giving us an understanding of genuine water usage around the site. This has already allowed us to quickly identify suspected leaks within certain zones at Sutton Bonington and will allow us to more effectively target our programme of planned replacement of the water mains.
For example, the graph shows data from a submeter serving some of the glasshouses at Sutton Bonington in December 2013. Water usage dropped by 30,000 litres per day following a repair.
Following the success of this pilot, a similar network of submeters is due to be installed at University Park in 2014.