"Digitalization emerges as an opportunity to optimize resource usage and enhance management"

Can you explain what "smart water" is?

Smart Water, often referred to as Water 4.0 taken from the term Industry 4.0, emphasizes digitalization and automation as essential components of a strategy for efficient, flexible, and competitive water management. By leveraging technologies such as hardware, software, and analytics, this approach empowers water and wastewater utilities to tackle challenges effectively through automation, connectivity, data collection, and analysis, and is effectively transforming the ways water and wastewater can be managed by improving OT (Operational Technology) systems beyond traditional methods.

In a context where the production of industrial wastewater is higher than ever, and freshwater resources are becoming increasingly scarce to meet current and future demands, digitalization emerges as a significant opportunity to optimize resource usage and enhance management efficiency. In fact, the new EU urban wastewater treatment directive emphasizes the role of digitalization in improving monitoring and reporting methods, as well as in optimizing wastewater collection, storage, and treatment systems.

The benefits to water management are significant, including implementing predictive maintenance strategies, process enhancement, regulatory compliance, and reduced energy consumption among others.

Could you describe the transformative potential of digital solutions in water management systems?

Digital solutions can improve operational performance providing real-time visibility into water quality and quantity across the entire network

They hold significant potential in several areas within the operational environment, I will focus on three of them; First, optimization of maintenance operations by reducing costs, for example with secure remote access technologies to control systems, which saves 30-80% of the trips. This approach also optimizes resource allocation and implements efficient inspection and maintenance programs. Moreover, early detection of equipment failures with diagnostics tools and proactive predictive maintenance models that analyze data can anticipate issues before they arise. A report by ABB estimates that the water industry’s downtime cost is $98,222.22. This proactive strategy can boost productivity by approximately 25%, decrease breakdowns by 75%, and lower maintenance costs by 25-30%. This is particularly relevant for the rental industry or for remote or unattended assets.

Second, digital solutions can improve operational performance providing real-time visibility into water quality and quantity across the entire network. They aid in decision-making processes with data-driven insights, improve leak detection, and increase the resilience of water systems against climate change and other challenges.

Third, they contribute to developing an efficient energy management strategy by identifying opportunities to reduce energy consumption in water treatment and distribution systems, especially in pumps and aeration systems. With adequate information, energy consumption can potentially be reduced by 15% to 35%, depending on the specific process involved.

What specific benefits can integrators, factories, and utilities gain from implementing smart water solutions?

For System integrators, Digital solutions represent a chance to gain deeper insights into their systems through platforms and analytics tools while providing new value-added services to their clients. This shift fosters stronger collaboration and long-term agreements and is leading to innovative business models and increased recurring revenues. Companies like Envirochemie exemplify this trend with their platforms designed for the customer to have better insights into what is happening in the assets with real-time data monitoring, maintenance and plant management etc. The Italian company IWE, which specializes in manufacturing evaporators and concentrators, remotely operates its machines, allowing for setup modifications without the need for on-site intervention. This approach not only significantly reduces transfer costs but also ensures the prompt restoration of optimal functionality. With remote operations, experts are always kept up to date on the status of the plant, and so they can easily and efficiently optimize operation and react to changing operating conditions.

For industrial treatment, digitalization is accelerating the outsourcing of services, where water treatment often falls outside the core expertise of the factory owner.

Currently, many maintenance and operational tasks do not necessitate specialized personnel on-site, and we see more applications OTaaS (OT as a Service), for instance with the SCADA in the cloud providing service to several municipalities.

What are the primary obstacles to successfully implementing these digital solutions?

Financial resources tend to prioritize maintaining uninterrupted system operations, causing digitalization efforts to be relegated to a secondary concern

Firstly, it's crucial to recognize that the concept of Smart Water or digitalization extends beyond merely introducing new technologies. It also encompasses cultural and organizational factors that are frequently overlooked, which can lead to internal resistance and hinder successful implementation. Therefore, a shift in processes and mindset is crucial for fostering cross-departmental collaboration, educating employees on digital transformation initiatives, and securing involvement from C-level executives.

However, when implementing an OT project, several significant barriers emerge. A primary challenge is often funding constraints, particularly for public water systems or municipalities. In these contexts, water is frequently regarded as a commodity, which can lead to delays in strategic investment decisions. Consequently, financial resources tend to prioritize maintaining uninterrupted system operations, causing digitalization efforts to be relegated to a secondary concern. Moreover, measuring ROI is not that easy, as new technologies often lack evidence of their results. To address this situation, the EU's NextGenerationEU funding—provided through the Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) and National Recovery and Resilience Plans (RRPs) allocated to each member state —is anticipated to serve as a driving force for digitalization projects within the sector.

Of course, cybersecurity remains a primary barrier to digitalization in operational technology (OT) environments across all sectors. In the water sector, where numerous public attack incidents have already occurred, companies find themselves increasingly vulnerable to cyberattacks that threaten both systems availability and customer data security. The sector's critical importance and high media visibility make it an appealing target for cybercriminals. Additionally, the convergence of information technology (IT) and operational technology (OT) through digitalization further exposes essential water infrastructure to these cyber threats.

Based on our experience, I would emphasize a critical technical barrier often underestimated at the outset of a project: the significance of automation and industrial connectivity for collecting accurate data at the right time. To fully harness the benefits of digitalization, systems must be interconnected securely and efficiently, but this is usually challenging to achieve for operators due to the presence of data silos and a variety of electromechanical equipment from different vendors in the plant, each with its own unique communication protocols. As a result, ensuring seamless communication between these devices can become complicated. In addition to this, many existing control systems used in industrial operations are outdated and not equipped to handle modern technologies. This creates further complications as critical operations are still reliant on these legacy systems.

With HMS solutions and expertise in industrial connectivity and cybersecurity, we have become a key partner for companies in the water sector that need to embark on their journey towards digitalization.