Companies Team Up for 'Smart Water Now' Program

CH2M Hill, Envision Charlotte, Itron Inc., Siemens and Verizon announced July 10 that Envision Charlotte—a public-private initiative that leverages sustainability for economic growth as a model for all communities—is launching its second model program, Smart Water Now: a water measurement and efficiency program that will follow the Smart Energy Now program already underway.

Envision Charlotte and the city of Charlotte are collaborating with solution providers to design and install the system. CH2M Hill is managing the entire project; Itron is providing water communication modules, the network infrastructure, cloud services and data aggregation; and Verizon will gather the water usage data from a network of machine-to-machine devices and transport near real-time information to kiosks utilizing its 4G LTE network. Siemens is providing project support.

Building occupants can track the city’s progress on interactive kiosks, smart phones and websites along with existing energy information. The design has been established, the downtown surveys have begun and Envision Charlotte expects to have its new program in place in the fall of 2012.

Like its sister program for energy, Smart Water Now will aggregate information into a single number representing the total usage, then drive awareness and behavior change to reduce consumption. The results will lower operational costs, improve sustainability, engage occupants and contribute to the overall value proposition of working and living in Center City.