BARRHEAD-The County of Barrhead will soon have an upgraded tool to help the municipality monitor the quality of its drinking water in Neerlandia and Manola.
On Dec. 1 councillors unanimously approved a recommendation by public works to approve up to $262,143 in upgrades to its supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system. The approval is conditional on the Barrhead Regional Water Commission (BRWC) contribution of $143,078 to the project. Funding for the municipality's portion would come from the Federal Gas Tax.
The BRWC is an independent body comprised of members of the Barrhead municipalities. The commission is the owner of the region’s water infrastructure, pipelines and water treatment plant. They then sell the water to the municipalities, which in turn, resell it to their residents.
It should be noted that the organization has money set aside in reserves for the project and they are expected to rubber-stamp it at their upcoming meeting next week.
Public works manager Travis Wierenga said the upgrades would allow the municipality to integrate all of its sites, Neerlandia, Manola and Northplex into one monitoring system. Currently, only the Northplex and Neerlandia pumping stations are tied into the SCADA system.
"The current system allows our staff to monitor some aspects of the Neerlandia water system from the public works office," he said, adding the booster station can be remotely viewed but not controlled as it is a stand-alone system. "The Northplex fire suppression system has the capability to be monitored and controlled remotely, but the connection has never actually been made to it."
Wierenga added that the majority of the SCADA system was set up in 2009 in conjunction with the construction of the Neerlandia regional water line and that the equipment, as well as the software, hasn't been received a substantial upgrade since its installation.
He said the system as it is currently configured can only be monitored from a sole desktop computer at the public works office.
"Alarm call outs rely on an auto-dial system and over the last year its reliability is in question," Wierenga said. "It has been dialing out and making calls it isn't supposed to."
The upgrades would allow remote monitoring via a smart device, text alerts. The latter would especially improve the system's reliability, as cellphone coverage in many areas of the county is spotty at best.
In the summer Apex Automation, an Edmonton-based electrical engineering company specializing in automation systems, completed a review of the SCADA system and recommended several upgrades.
"The goal of upgrading our SCADA system is that the county does its due diligence in meeting and exceeding Alberta Environment's requirements and ensuring the safety of our water system," he said, noting several of the system's components are obsolete and are or will shortly become unserviceable when inevitable breakdowns occur.
Required upgrades include replacing outdated hardware and software that is no longer supported. Optional upgrades include a control upgrade that would allow staff to remotely view and control the SCADA system via a smart device.
The required upgrades if tying in Manola is not factored come in at just over $69,000, with the municipality being responsible for just under $33,000. If the optional work and the upgrades to incorporate Manola into the system the total price tag balloons to $262,143 with the county being responsible for $119,065.
Among the largest of the optional expenses is the upgrade to the BRWC's booster station to help get water through its mainline to Neerlandia.
The upgrade would allow them to analyze the amount of chlorine in the water and if needed give them the ability to adjust the amount.
"It is quite a challenge to make sure the amount chlorine stays at the right level all the way through the system," Wierenga said, adding what makes the task more difficult is that they don't have a way to monitor chlorine levels at the booster station. "We do have an injection pump but it is controlled manually based on what our readings are in Neerlandia, so we are always reacting and are always a day or two behind."
However, the option that potentially that could have the biggest impact for public works staff is the ability to monitor and control the system remotely.
"It is not needed, but if something were to happen over the weekend or after hours, you don't have to run into the shop," he said.
