early leak detection for vitens

Vitens

Early Leak Detection for Water Supplier Vitens

Eraneos was chosen to help the company make steps toward an intelligent drinking water supply system

The Challenge

Vitens launched The Open Data Initiative in 2015, choosing Eraneos out of 30 other contenders to help it solve several challenges that the company was facing in regard to its drinking water supply system. Its main goal was to accurately detect events as they happened in the pipeline network thus preventing impurities in the water supply and stopping water leaks.

Assisting the organization in its quest for data activation by building up knowledge and experience around data and analytics

The approach

This project was all about defining the next steps with data to get an intelligent drinking water supply system for Vitens.

At that time, leak detection within the network was a reactive process that depended on information processing by experienced specialists. So, we got to work by performing an analysis of data regarding pressure, flow, level, and water quality sensors in the drinking water supply system.

We also looked into the possibilities of the available data, the abnormalities that this data showed, and the opportunities that it offered to business operations to improve and speed up Vitens’ communication with its customers.

Vitens is the largest water management company in the Netherlands, supplying top-quality drinking water to more than 5.6 million individuals and organizations. In its pursuit to become more data-driven, Vitens sent out an open challenge to data analysts and experts in 2015 to see who can come up with the best solution for their goals. Eraneos came up trumps.

The result

In improving the quality of Vitens’ water supply system, we used data-driven solutions by creating algorithms that are able to analyze the quality of drinking water in real-time across a 9,000 km sensor-equipped pipeline. The sensors are able to detect leaks in the valves within the network. We also set up AI chatbot technology, which aids Vitens in accelerating communication with customers, improving its business operations. Together with our graduate trainees that remained in the company, these solutions made sure Vitens’ data needs are met and the project is an ongoing success.

Let’s create sustainable change together.