How can the Riventa solution help you reduce your energy bills?

Energy is the second-largest cost center for the production and supply of drinking water. Pumping alone accounts for 70% of drinking water production plant energy bills. The Riventa solution measures the true efficiency of pump systems as the basis for reducing their high level of energy consumption. 

1. Riventa: a simple solution that can be tailored to meet the specific needs of individual local authorities

2. A more sustainable model for drinking water production at lower cost

The processes involved in abstracting water from the natural world, treating it to a standard fit for human consumption, pumping it and delivering it to consumers are very energy intensive. For local authorities, this means significant levels of expense. Fortunately, technical solutions are now available to reduce the energy bills involved in drinking water production. They include the Riventa solution developed by Saur Group in partnership with a British startup that has 15 years of expertise as a specialist in pump system efficiency measurement.

Going much further than simply providing a technical solution, Riventa conducts comprehensive diagnostic analyses of drinking water pump systems as the basis for optimizing their use. Its services use innovative technologies to provide accurate, frequent and real-time monitoring of pump performance. The accurate and reliable data generated can then be used to optimize the settings and operation of existing systems, and precisely schedule maintenance operations or replacement of the pumps installed in an industrial plant. Riventa also calculates the financial cost of poor performance to provide a more accurate estimate of the potential return on investment in maintenance and/or replacement. 

One local authority in the Île-de-France region near Paris has already used the combined expertise of Saur Group and Riventa to analyze the operation of seven pumps. The initial diagnosis showed that the performance of certain pumps was particularly poor. Financially, this poor performance was costing the authority twice as much as it should. The Riventa solution made it possible to validate new pump settings as the most effective solution for reducing the energy bill for this facility, reducing the cost per cubic meter of water produced from €0.025 to €0.018. And all for zero capital investment!

Riventa: a simple solution that can be tailored to meet the specific needs of individual local authorities

In addition to the obvious cost benefits, the Riventa solution is also easy to install and use. It calculates the pump flow rate using accurate and reliable measurements of temperature and pressure, as well as the amount of electricity supplied to the pump motor. It can be implemented quickly, and involves no on-site installation work. Riventa requires only one measurement point upstream of the pump to be monitored, and another downstream. Each measurement point involves positioning a probe on a (usually existing) connection. The probes and watt meters use wireless technology to communicate with the data processing software installed on a module housed in a small portable unit.

The Riventa solution can be adapted to meet the specific needs of each local authority. The experts at the British startup begin by gathering as much data as possible on the drinking water production plant: the number of pumps and their specifications, pump locations, measurement points, power sources, etc. A detailed audit of this data is then conducted to identify the most appropriate service, which then forms the basis of the recommendation to the local authority concerned.

• The first level of the Riventa service involves measuring the performance of one or more pumps over a few hours of operation. The data collected is compared with the performance characteristics of a new pump to estimate the need for maintenance or replacement.
• The second level monitors the performance of the pump system over 14 days of operation to provide a more detailed understanding of how the pumps are working and operated in real time, 24/7, weekends or at times of peak production, for example. This option provides an accurate overview of the annual cost of running your pump system, and the potential savings you could make in terms of energy consumption.

A more sustainable model for drinking water production at lower cost

• The third and final level of the service is the permanent installation of sensors for real-time management throughout the working life of the pump. Each of these three levels is used by Riventa to deliver recommendations, prioritized in terms of their expected return on investment. The local authority is then free to choose which recommendations they adopt and implement. They are likely to range from the simple optimization of PLC settings to targeted replacement of individual pumps. The local authority will then be able to rely on the expertise of Saur to implement the selected recommendations and deliver energy cost reductions of up to 20%.

Looking further to the future, the Riventa solution may even add a new level of control to the supply systems of smart cities. Integrating all sources of water, available storage capacity, pumping stations and other infrastructures, electricity tariffs and consumer demand into a single complex algorithm could make it possible to produce drinking water more sustainably, more reliably... and at lower cost.

Would you like to find out more?