AEdP: The Management Entity
Águas e Energia do Porto (AEdP) is the municipal company responsible for the integrated management of the Urban Water Cycle in the Municipality of Porto, integrating the Water Supply System (WSS), the drainage and treatment of waste water, the drainage of rainwater, management of water lines and bathing areas, energy management and renewable energies, as well as environmental education.
Porto has one of the largest and densest WSS at national level, concentrated in the second largest Portuguese city and including a total of 820 km of massively meshed adduction and distribution pipelines, 125,450m3 of maximum reserve installed in six reservoirs, around 71,225 domiciliary branches, approximately 160,000 customers supplied daily and, globally, 170,000 meters installed in the network.
THE PATH FOR SUSTAINABILITY AND EFFICIENCY
AEdP is focused on the environmental, economic-financial and social WSS sustainability of the Company and the Municipality so the water losses reduction and non-revenue water (N-RW) is essential and has been an absolute strategy of the company in the last 15 years.
Since 2006, when it had a N-RW rate of 52.4%, AEdP began its journey in reducing water losses. More recently, apparent/commercial losses have assumed an increasing fundamental representation and, as such, the company designed the Management Plan and Renewal of Meters and Reinforcement of Telemetry in Customers.
The replacement of water meters saw its rate increase massively from 2018, and between July of that year and June 2021 more than 70,000 meters were replaced corresponding to an approximate renewal rate of 45%, and thus, greatly reducing the global average error of the meter park and increasing its measurement reliability.
INVESTMENT IN SMART METERS
Associated to an increase on the water meters renewal rate there was also a strong investment by AEdP in the installation of a residential telemetry solution believing that this is the future of the sector and the right approach to a strategic and technological WSS management.
Since 2018, AEdP has mostly been installing meters equipped with a telemetry system for collection and remote communication of consumption. In June 2018 only 16% of the entity’s meter park had an integrated telemetry system in a primitive approach to its installation in places of difficult access for manual collection of readings. In June 2021, AEdP has more than 84,000 active meters with this technology, which corresponds to 53% of the Municipality’s Customers meaning a growth of 37% in just three years.
One of the first direct results of this strategic change was the reduction in the need for manual meter readings. Human reading routes were restructured from 20 to 14. The project ended in May 2021 generating annual savings of €150,000 in resources. Along with this optimization the huge increase on real meter readings was another advantage greatly reducing billing estimations.
A NET OF ANTENNA AND CONCENTRATORS
The residential telemetry strategy materialized not only in the meters, but also in the installation of 15 new macro concentrators for massive collection of Customer consumption data, by area of influence, integration and encryption of data and periodic sending to the data center in the AEdP.
These 15 new macro units are associated with the 16 micro units that already exist in specific points of the urban area materializing the concept of “Porto 100% Telemetry” that transforms the city of Porto into a digital network of concentrators that allows the coverage of practically the whole area.
ADVANTAGES FOR THE CUSTOMER
From a strategic management point of view this technology does not only bring advantages to AedP. Through the App it’s possible to obtain meter readings in real time which allows AEdP to offer a higher quality service and proximity to the customer thus benefiting from an excellent service in the sustainable management of their consumption:
(1) Evolution and daily analysis of consumption
(2) Comparison of consumption with similar periods
(3) Warning of water leaks and anomalous consumption
(4) Water quality data
(5) Notification and Notices of communication from the AEdP (occurrences/anomalies, service suspensions)
(6) Quality of drinking water
(7) Tips for reducing water consumption and sustainable use
Furthermore, telemetry meters do not require constant manual readings, which means that customers do not need this inconvenience. Their monthly bill reflects actual consumption without any associated estimations.
RESULTS FOR THE MANAGEMENT ENTITY
he strategy of strengthening telemetry in the network of active meters in the WSS allows AEdP to have a more technologically advanced management in the public distribution network. When compared to normal meters, the meters provided with telemetry system offer internal advantages such as the analysis of consumption profiles, support for hydraulic modeling and calibration of networks, the reduction of estimated readings, the reduction of losses because the action on anomalies is faster, the increase in productivity due to the possibility of allocating human resources to other functions, more expeditious management
of the meter park and based on real data, detection of water returns and zero consumption, confirmation of illegal activities and consumption below and above the monthly average.
In addition to the aforementioned advantages, this strategy encourages the holistic and integrated management of the Municipality’s WSS as a smart city and allows AEdP a very positive evolution in terms of the management of real water losses in the District Metered Area (DMA). This is done through the refinement of the calculation of the Water Balance of each zone and, as such, efficiently directing resources to actual needs. This is an important change in the current paradigm of attacking water losses and N-RW a strategy that proves to be one of the biggest challenges of the coming times in ensuring maximum sustainability of the WSS.
“Porto 100% Telemetry” is therefore one of several strategic projects that AEdP has been implementing since the end of 2006, with the clear ambition of reducing the N-RW to values close to the economic level of water losses. In 2006 AEdP had a N-RW rate of 52.4% ending 2020 with a rate of 17.1% representing a very aggressive and effective improvement in the WSS. 2020 was also the year in which the highest percentage of telemetry meters installed in customers most of them being read remotely through the installed concentrators and drive-by equipment whose data is very important for the continuous improvement of water losses rates. At the end of 2020, AEdP registered the lowest volume of water losses ever – 9,400 m3/day – and accumulated global savings of more than 63 million euros since 2006.
A PROMISING FUTURE
This management more focused on obtaining information allows customers to gain greater knowledge of their water usage as well as variations in consumption. Associated with this knowledge comes the possibility of a more effective management and a more sustainable use of this increasingly precious and relevant resource.
The future is, therefore, very challenging considering the continuity of the “Porto 100% Telemetry” project and its integration with the other strategies and operations to reduce losses in the WSS, with current N-RW values that place AEdP as a reference to national and international level in the sector, efficient and sustainable service management.