Like small cities, airports operate water distribution networks. Used for both industrial and potable water purposes, these airport networks distribute over a million cubic meters of water per annum. Like all water distribution networks, there are pumps and wells to maintain, decisions to make about network pressure, concerns about leakages, and opportunities to consume responsibly across all forms of water usage and consumption. Within the WATERNOMICS Project, airport operator SEA in collaboration with sustainability consultant R2M and sensor provider VTEC are working together to design and implement water savings solutions at the Linate Airport. Major actions include considering the network and its management within a standards based approach (ISO50001), designing and implementing a metering/sensoring network to support a water information platform, and developing a distribution network simulation model to test and eventually implement various water savings solutions. Engaging decision makers, training staff and communicating to the millions of passengers that pass through the airport are a major component of the planned activities. Meeting of minds To bring this pilot to life, the 2nd WATERNOMICS project meeting was held at Linate Airport 8 – 9 October 2014 in association with SEA and all of the WATERNOMICS consortium partners. Meetings objectives were:
- To present and discuss consortium work to date
- To conduct end user interviews with airport staff, maintenance technicians and resource managers about what functionalities would be useful in a water information platform
- To tour and take decisions related to the pilot area at Linate for the project
- To collect information about the Linate water infrastructure to enable the selection of sensors to facilitate capturing baseline information and to plan water saving intervention measures
Project Coordinator Ed Curry of DERI at NUIG discusses the WATERNOMICS platform user functionalities and a linked data approach
SEA escorts the consortium through a tour of the airport water infrastructure network The meeting was a success and important step forward for the project. For the researchers, it was a good opportunity to view first hand the complexities of a corporate environment and in specific an airport where security, flight schedules and services to passengers must be accommodated always. For the airport, it was interesting to interface with the WATERNOMICS platform developers about what types of information, tools and means of communication would help them do their job better with respect to resource management.Setting a water management baseline Several technical meetings have been scheduled before and after the Consortium meeting to organize and plan activities for the Linate Pilot. First steps were to understand the water distribution network, existing equipment infrastructure, and available historical consumption data. For many distribution network managers, this task is complex as areas of the network are constructed over discrete points in time, using different types of equipment and changed by routine maintenance, repairs and replacements along the way. Second steps were to select areas of the airport and strategies that would have the greatest impact and best support the objectives of the project. In doing so, it was required to interview, reflect and determine what key performance indicators were most important to the management and also feasible for the airport to implement. A third step was to design a measurement and verification plan aligned with the international protocol IPMVP to capture the baseline consumption data and make possible future comparisons.
Analyzing the Linate water distribution network with operational and maintenance managers at SEA
Discharge point n. 4: Accessible, but extremely deep and narrow. Raven Eye sensor Critical to this part of the discussion was developing a solution for open channel sewage flow to which the consortium responded by selecting an ultrasonic sensor called the Raven-Eye which is non contact and no maintenance (Specifications Raven Eye). These sensors will be installed in the first quarter of 2015 well in advance of the project water resource efficiency measures so that the best possible historical consumption data will be available. The installation of these sensors may in some cases be more challenging than one might think as access points can be under road surfaces, the exact location of the underground open channel may need to be pinpointed, and any disruptions to traffic of any kind at an airport have to be treated with extreme attention to detail.