Smart meters at 175 filling stations to monitor, save water

According to an official, the project is being implemented under Smart City Mission, and the Chennai Smart City Limited (CSCL) is coordinating the implementation of the project. As of now, Metro Water is maintaining 191 filling posts in 41 filling stations.

“Smart meter installation works are in progress in remaining 16 filling posts. Apart from the smart meters, the new water disbursement system also has smart card-based online monitoring of filling post system,” the official said. Earlier, there was no smart monitoring system to control and monitor the flow of water and the exact quantity of water filled in the tankers. Metro Water is supplying nearly 50 million litres of water to the areas that are yet to get the pipelines by hiring contract tanker lorries every day.

“We are providing 6,000 litres of water per tanker per trip. However, the capacity of tankers may vary one lorry to another. So, we need a monitoring system to keep a check and prevent wastage. This also would prevent the tapping of excess water from the filling posts,” the official added. 

Under the new monitoring system, tanker lorry drivers must insert smart cards provided by the Metro Water into the filling posts to start the pump automatically. It will stop pumping once 6,000 litres of water is filled in the tankers. The smart filling posts will also track the number of trips each tanker lorry makes every day.

Metro Water has allocated Rs 11.75 crore for the smart filling post project and fixed a target to complete the project before April this year. Meanwhile, the water manager has also installed smart meters in 3,314 commercial establishments to measure the amount of water they consume for their operations. 

The plan is to install smart meters in 12,708 commercial establishments and industries under the Smart City Mission at a cost of Rs 9.50 crore.