Below is a recent email that was sent to an existing client where we support being eyes and ears for water consumption related issues for a large, suburban apartment building in the greater Toronto metropolitan area.
Despite having access to the platform, alerts, notifications, and ensuing insights, our clients are only human. It can be a struggle to digest, interpret, and otherwise get to the gist of the data, which floods clients (no pun intended), on a regular basis.
What we have endeavoured to do for our clients is to cut-to-the-chase, refine the data and ensuing implications, and inferences in order to enable them to make informed decisions.
Dear John:
FYI - I have included three snapshots from the IoT sensor on the water meter showing
The midnight to 3 am irrigation cycle and;
The daily volume for this 7 day week cycle and;
The Avg flow rate (L / min) during the overnight watering cycle
We have been coming across similar profiles in other buildings and have seen;
Variances where the irrigation systems are set up to run every second day and/or
Situations where the irrigation system is set up with rain sensors so the system is not engaged when its raining and/or systems that monitor leaks
A rough estimate would suggest the daily cost of irrigation (in the low cost water / sewer Region of Peel) is running $55 - $65 / day or $1500 - $1800 per month during the irrigation season.
This might be something worth following up with the entity that services and maintains the sprinkler system to see about stretching out the cycle and/or weighing the cost of a "smart" system for realizing some efficiencies.
From my initial conversations with two different service entities, savings for 'smart' irrigation systems generally fall in 30% plus category.
The one key metric that I was able to see from this data was the flow rate (assuming a 1 ½" line) is running in excess of 100 L / min during the irrigation cycle. The Avg flow rate during irrigation is 144 L / min. I would suggest if you're going to review / engage with your service provider, this is one metric to focus on in terms of judging what a smart system might / could do for your irrigation usage and what they would be targeting for a flow rate. Presumably the flow rate would be in the 100 L / min range - which on the surface would appear to support an approximate reduction of 33%.
Midnight to 4 am view of water consumption during Irrigation Cycle
Weekly usage by Hour highlight peak between 1 am - 3 am
“Heat Map” with Dark squares representing > usage per hour
Conclusion:
With this data and insight the Energy Manager is in a position to evaluate the investment and payback to fine tune the amount of water used in overnight irrigation
Specific metrics including flow rate, duration of water usage and frequency all contribute to a clearer picture of consumption and what can or should be done to be more efficient