Cincinnati Utilizes M2M For Smart Water Solutions

The world's population is indeed growing and it could grow billions in the next few years. This literally means more people need potable water, thus increasing the demand for the already deficient resource. Water consumption has tripled in the last fifty years, according to the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency), and developing cities are always the focal point of this sustainability concern. The concept of developing smart cities to address sustainability issues and global growth problems, has caught the attention of the government and the private sector. Smart cities cover various sectors such as smart energy, smart integration, smart public services, smart buildings, smart mobility and smart water. Smartwater is an intelligent water system that brings together various technologies such that of machine-to-machine cellular communication.

The City of Cincinnati, together with Qualcomm Technologies, Inc., an American global manufacturer of semiconductors and wireless telecommunication products, will leverage such technology to build CH2M Hill Water Technology Innovation Project. This project will design and implement an integrated water connectivity solution and resource management for sustainable water. It will enable the city to collect information from its water systems and the aggregate of these information will be utilized to design means of improving the quality of water as well as help manage the city's water resources.

CH2M HILL's Intelligent Water Solutions director, Ken Thompson said, "This technology being implemented by Cincinnati will serve as a model for other U.S. utilities looking to invest in water resources for economic and environmental benefits," He further added, "While there are many potential solutions that can address water infrastructure challenges in the United States, introducing new technologies, such as machine-to-machine(M2M) technology in our water and environmental systems, will transform the water industry and give utilities, like Cincinnati, a powerful tool to collect, process and analyze what is happening throughout their water systems."

The city government understands that its water distribution and management system must be feasible and practical for long term in order to sustain its growth and demand. Smart water systems have to be equipped with the capability to be monitored and networked with other equally critical smart systems to obtain more granular data and generate a much sophisticated useful, actionable information. That's why working with Qualcomm Technologies and CH2M HILL while utilizing M2M technology will give them the much-needed focus to ensure the success of this project, as having safe and reliable water supply is one of the critical operators for economic success and stability.