Bancroft council approved a $10,000 pilot project that will see remote water reading meters installed in some homes in town.
The project was approved by council last week.
Treasurer Bill Davies explained that the current system involves a sub-contractor manually reading water meters at each location for every individual account. He said a change is needed because with this program if there is a problem, it could be multiple months before it’s noticed. “This delay can be costly and frustrating for customers,” Davies said. He explained this new process will see radio transmitters installed in the basement of select homes to serve as the test subjects for the pilot project. “We will strategically implant at various sites around town,” Davies said of the 10 transmitters that will be used.
He explained to council that the benefits will see reduced operating costs, improve water conservation, and being able to quickly identify stopped meters or negative water flow. Davies said it will also help with billing accuracy with data being relayed to the cloud service set up by the town multiple times every day. “The town will also be able to provide rapid feedback to the customer where pre-set water tolerances have been exceeded,” Davies added. “This will provide the customer with the opportunity to more quickly resolve their issues. The customer is also able to download for free a smartphone or tablet app that will provide information at their fingertips. They can also view the data via their computer. The system will accumulate data for years so that a historical
perspective and comparisons can be achieved.”
The project will be undertaken with the help of Badger Meter, who will supply the ORION Cellular LTE Endpoint radio transmitters and other equipment. Gareth Price joined council to discuss the project.
He said the Endpoint device will replace the existing touchpad water meters in town use. “The data transmission would be done four times per day which would include the unique serial number, the meter read data and any applicable status or alert indicators although the transmitter would read the meter data in 15-minute intervals,” he explained.
Price said that with customers and the town being able to see the data more often, it will allow both sides to quickly identify any problems and fix them.
The current billing system is bi-monthly which Davies explained to council doesn’t allow them to identify problems as quickly as a remote water meter would.
Under the proposed system, a monthly transmission fee would be associated on residents’ bills. Davies explained the monthly service fee would include automatic software updates and support along with system maintenance.