Wastewater Management: Small town in Austria speeds past megacities in digitalization
Smart town "Laab im Walde" in Austria is not shy about adopting modern
technologies
Wastewater Management: Small town in Austria speeds past megacities in digitalization
Water
Laab im Walde
Laab im Walde Austria
Laab im
Walde is a very small town with a long history in the county of Mödling in Lower
Austria and has fewer than 1,500 inhabitants. The smart town is not shy when it comes to modern technologies in
areas including lighting, drinking water supply, and infrastructure. Mayor
Peter Klar has studied technology, law, medicine, and management and does his
best every day to advance the digitalization of his town and to offer residents
new digital services.
Siemens products have long been used in Laab im Walde for various infrastructure automation tasks. The control and visualization system in the town was recently refurbished in collaboration with the systems integrator enet Engineering network.
Drinking water supply in Laab im Walde: The system was automated together with Siemens and equipped with WinCC
V7 and S7-1200, which also allows leaks to be detected early on. WinCC V7 is
used as an innovative, scalable process visualization system (SCADA system)
with numerous powerful functions for the monitoring of automated processes and
S7-1200 as a controller with integrated communication and technology functions
to perform automation tasks flexibly and efficiently.
The scalable WinCC V7
system and relevant add-ons can generate automated reports on a weekly,
monthly, or annual basis. Pre-programmed library components developed
specifically for water and wastewater management also make engineering
considerably easier for the contractor enet.
The complete technical infrastructure (street distribution cabinets, lighting, remote monitoring) was upgraded with an S7 control system (S7-1200 including communication processors, Scalance switches, and WinCC).
“Integrating
IT and automation is especially challenging for small towns like ours. We are
thankful to have found reliable partners for the digitalization of our
community in Siemens and enet.”
Dr. Peter Klar, Major of Laab im Walde
The
modernization of the drinking water supply system has reduced the leak rate
from between 20 and 30 percent to between 5 and 10 percent. In addition to the
enormous environmental and technical benefits of detecting water seepage into
the ground, the town can also save around €100,000 per year in costs for
otherwise lost water. Roughly 40 burst pipes have also already been averted in
homes.
The feed
units in the water network pumping station can switch over to one or more
additional potable water lines via S7-1200 and WinCC V7 if needed. In
emergencies, Mayor Klar can control the pumping station via smartphone, and
feed additional water into the town network in the event of a major fire, for
example.
Each future
step is considered carefully in advance to guarantee that the town will save
costs.
In ten to twenty years, the evaluation of the collected qualitative data
should make it possible to determine in advance which streets need to be
refurbished and which lines need to be replaced.
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