Going Green – Creating Sustainable Water and WastewaterSolutions

Going green and identifying energy-efficient sustainable solutions is a hot topic of conversation across the globe. Advances in technologies are driving sustainable city development. Today, city governments are recognizing that using technology to build and improve infrastructure efficiency and effectiveness contributes to future economic prosperity and improving quality of life.

Our partner, Siemens, has the technology portfolio and consulting expertise to make cities more livable, competitive, and sustainable. In addition, Siemens offers the ability for budget-strapped cities to make infrastructure improvements with alternative funding methods. Siemens Performance-based Contracts allow municipalities to pay for their capital and energy improvements through their guaranteed energy, labor and cost savings.

One of the most important and costly aspects of city management is water and wastewater. Municipalities are responsible for drawing water from the source; treating, distributing and delivering drinking water; collecting and treating wastewater; and returning high quality reclaimed water back into the watershed. Many cities have water and wastewater treatment facilities that are aging and inefficient.

With the assistance of Siemens Industry’s Infrastructure & Cities Sector, the City of Fair Oaks Ranch in Texas recognized the need to modernize and improve its water and wastewater infrastructure. Funded by Siemens Performance-based Contract, the City contracted Siemens to make the improvements. The anticipated payback period for the City of Fair Oaks is approximately fourteen years.

Patti Engineering Water and WastewaterSiemensSiemens selected Patti Engineering to support the project. Planned improvements will save energy and conserve water through investment in new, energy-efficient, environmentally responsible technology and equipment. Using automation and wireless Ethernet technology, the city’s water and wastewater management systems, currently utilizing mostly manual systems, will be upgraded to a reliable state-of-the-art energy and resource efficient system.

Patti Engineering will be designing and implementing a new supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system and Human Machine Interfaces (HMI’s) to allow for central control and management of equipment. Installation of the latest generation Siemens Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs) on equipment at the city’s wells, lift stations, and elevated storage tanks will ensure communications to the new SCADA system.  Wireless communication will be established to replace auto-dialers eliminating the high cost of phone lines.

The city’s twenty-eight wells,  seven lift stations, and eight elevated storage tanks will wirelessly communicate information and alarming directly through the new user-friendly SCADA system to provide pertinent valve position,  tank level,  pressure, and pump information on desktop and mobile devices in real-time. Authorized City workers will now have the ability to monitor and control the City’s wells, lift stations, and elevated storage tank equipment without having to spend hours driving around town to each station and tank.

“It was a pleasure working with Patti Engineering on the development of a SCADA system to be incorporated into our Performance Contract with the City of Fair Oaks Ranch.   Their local support and technical expertise helped our team develop a solution for our customer’s needs.  The proposed SCADA system will help the City of Fair Oaks Ranch save energy and operational cost associated with their water and wastewater infrastructure and backup power needs,” explains Chad Nobles, Executive Accounts, EES,  Siemens Industry’s  Infrastructure & Cities Sector. “Patti Engineering’s ability to create a flexible and cost-effective solution met our standards and criteria, as well as our customers.”

Siemens will also be replacing aging and inefficient water meters with automated meter reading (AMR) technology. The new automatic water meters will wirelessly transmit consumption data and allow the city to account for every customer’s daily usage, eliminating human error. The new meters will be more accurate and streamline reading routines—freeing staff resources and reducing expenses associated with the manual reading of the city’s old meters.

Patti Engineering is a CSIA Certified control system integrator and a Siemens Automation Solution Partner. Partnering with Siemens, Patti Engineering can provide comprehensive water and wastewater infrastructure renovation and expansion solutions. Siemens Guaranteed Performance-based Solutions Contract can provide cities with tight municipal budgets an alternative funding method.

For more information on water and wastewater solutions, please contact Patti Engineering: http://www.pattieng.com/contact-us.html.

Related categories: Blog Control Systems Integration Siemens

Nick Hitchcock's Bio

Texas Director of Operations

Hired in 2008, Nick Hitchcock has served in several engineering and management roles in the company’s Austin office. Starting out at the Michigan office, and moving to Texas in July 2010, he now serves as the Director of Texas Operations.