Water distribution networks suffer huge losses all over the world. The amount of water lost is typically about 20-30% of production

 

Qatar Mobility Innovations Centre (QMIC), an applied research and development centre founded by Qatar University in collaboration with Qatar Science &Technology Park (QSTP) successfully completed a three-year project to “develop an innovative system” for water leakage detection.

Water distribution networks suffer huge losses all over the world. According to industry figures, the amount of water lost is typically in the range of 20% to 30% of production.

In the case of some older systems, the percentage of water lost could be high as 50%. Hence, leakage remains the major source of inefficiency and it represents an acute problem not only in developing countries, but also in developed nations.

“Any cost-efficient and operationally effective solution, therefore can identify water leakages and represent a crucial step towards saving and preserving scarce water resources,” a release said. The successful completion of the project was jointly announced by Qatar Mobility Innovations Centre (QMIC) Politecnico di Torino (Polito), in Torino, Italy, recently.

The event was attended by a high level delegation from Qatar that included senior executives from QMIC, Qatar University, and the Qatar National Research Fund (QNRF). The event was also attended by the Rector of Polito and other senior local community leaders.  

In November 2009, QMIC and Polito launched a global research and development initiative called “Wireless innovations for water conservation” to tackle water leakage and quality issues in water distribution networks. Kahramaa in Qatar, the Regional Administration of Piedmont, SMAT, and CCAM in Italy supported the initiative as conservation of water resources is of interest globally.

Subsequently, a three-year project for the development of a new wireless-based solution to detect and monitor water leakage in underground distribution networks was launched in late 2009. The project was funded by a grant from QNRF through its NPRP programme.

QMIC Chairman Abdulla al-Talib said: “Today’s announcement represents another example of the progress QMIC is making in tackling global challenges and creating locally-engineered solutions and intellectual assets. This is a good example whereby building local capacity and know-how and using it for tackling global problems clearly demonstrate the progress Qatar is making in transforming itself into a knowledge-based economy”.

Rector of Polito, Professor Marco Gilli said: “We are very pleased with the achievement announced today. This clearly demonstrates that a combination of a common vision, together with following a collaborative model for research and development can deliver significant results that neither party can achieve on its own”.

QMIC Executive Director (CEO) Dr Adnan Abu-Dayya said: “After three-year of hard work by many colleagues, we are happy to announce the availability of an innovative prototype solution. This represents an end-to-end solution backed by unique intellectual property for wirelessly, effectively, and intelligently identifying the location and severity of the leakage in non-metallic water pipelines in underground distribution networks.

Although a lot more work and investment are needed to translate this into a commercially-feasible solution, today’s announcement represents a milestone as all key components and technologies are in place and working in the current prototype solution”.

To address the challenges in realising a cost-effective solution effectively and reliably, teams in Qatar and Italy worked collaboratively to execute on the many tasks of the project such as designing and developing a mobile sensor that can smoothly flow in the water pipes with the necessary sensing and transmission capabilities, designing and developing a communication gateway and protocols for collecting the data wirelessly from the mobile sensor and passing it for analysis by a dedicated cloud-based server, designing and developing a cloud-based server that has the necessary intelligence to process the received raw data and translate it into visual information about location of any leakage and its severity and setting up a lab and field test facility to carry necessary tests for the integrated system.

Qatar National Research Fund (QNRF) Executive Director Dr Abdul Sattar al-Taie said: “I congratulate the project team for their outstanding achievements. This project is exemplary of the core objectives of QNRF, in using research to serve the Qatari, regional and global community needs as well as building the local capacity and skills necessary for realising the Qatar National Research Strategy”.