American Water receives funding for R&D project to improve treatment plant operations

July 2, 2015
American Water has received an $800,000 award for a $2-million, 2-year research and development project, alongside IOSight from the Israel-U.S. Binational Industrial Research and Development Foundation.

VOORHEES, NJ, July 2, 2015 -- American Water (AW), the nation's largest publicly traded water and wastewater utility company, recently announced that it has received an $800,000 award for a $2-million, 2-year research and development (R&D) project, alongside IOSight, Ltd., a specialist in infrastructure facility management from the Israel-U.S. Binational Industrial Research and Development (BIRD) Foundation.

The project will support the R&D of decision support systems to improve the efficiency of water and wastewater treatment plant operations. It will develop data analysis tools within a data management and reporting framework at these facilities to identify operating efficiencies and potential cost savings. The proposed smart water management systems will develop and integrate comprehensive data management and analysis and reporting systems covering the major processes performed in plants.

This endeavor will allow plant operators to leverage the smart water management system reports and analytics to create improved, streamlined and more efficient operations. While focusing on single locations for water and wastewater, the research results will be useful to the larger North American water utility sector. Areas of improved efficiency will include chemical addition, energy and preventive maintenance.

"Increasing operational efficiency is a major priority at American Water and for many utilities around the world," said Dr. Mark LeChevallier, director of Innovation and Environmental Stewardship at AW. "While across our industry treatment plants are equipped with a multitude of sensors and collect a lot of data, most utilities do not make efficient use of this. Thus, it can be said that we are data rich but information poor. The innovation will allow us to better harness the data that we do collect and enable us to make actionable decisions to improve operations and save money, which ultimately benefits our customers."

See also:

"American Water names VPs of Investor Relations, Business Development, Strategy"

"American Water receives 29 national awards for water quality excellence"


About American Water


Founded in 1886, American Water is the largest publicly traded U.S. water and wastewater utility company. With headquarters in Voorhees, N.J., the company employs approximately 6,400 dedicated professionals who provide drinking water, wastewater and other related services to an estimated 15 million people in more than 45 states and parts of Canada. For more information, visit www.amwater.com.

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