第 1 部分：LoRa® 引领更智能的水资源管理

今年十一月，Semtech 将在巴黎再次参展欧洲公用事业周。这是世界上最重要的年度智能公用事业和计量大会，去年在维也纳举行并吸引了超过 12,000 名参观者。预计今年的出席人数将增加一半。作为此次巴黎大会的 800 多家参展公司之一，我们将展示 Semtech 用于创新公用事业计量应用的 LoRa® 器件和 LoRaWAN® 协议。在活动之前，我们将分三个部分介绍 LoRa 应用于公用事业的优势，本博客是第一部分。

Birdz: France’s Leader for Smart Water Metering

Several members of the LoRaWAN-based ecosystem, including the LoRa Alliance®, will be joining Semtech on the exhibition floor at European Utility Week and demonstrating their latest LoRa-based innovations for the metering industry. In this blog, we will be promoting one of these companies – France’s Birdz, a subsidiary of Nova Veolia and leading solution provider for the smart water metering market.

Birdz leverages its 19 years’ experience in the metering industry to help cities utilize their water resources more efficiently. Birdz’s millions of LoRa-enabled water meters across France gather hundreds of millions of data points daily to help utility providers, cities, buildings, and tertiary sector companies accurately monitor their water and energy bills, and improve their services. Birdz’s innovative solutions rely on LoRaWAN-based networking infrastructure from leading French telecom operator Orange, a member of the LoRa Alliance. Orange’s LoRaWAN-based network covers more than 30,000 municipalities and 95% of the French population. With nationwide coverage at their disposal, Birdz plans to expand their metering deployments throughout France and add an additional 3 million LoRa-based smart water meters in the years to come. In fact, Veolia, France’s leading utility provider and Birdz’s parent company, aims to leverage Orange’s network to read more than 70% of its installed water meters via LoRa by 2027.

Preventing Waste and Saving Money with LoRa

Between the water plant and the end consumer, supply grids lose a significant portion of the water produced due to undetected leaks in piping. According to Birdz, this loss may represent as much as 25% of production in some cases. In France, this would mean that out of 6 billion cubic meters of drinking water produced annually, 1.5 billion would be wasted. This represents significant losses for the supplier, largely due to the cost of production and the energy needed to manage and treat the water. Birdz’s water grid management solutions aim to reduce the impact of leaks and save customers money.

In 2015, Eau du Grand Lyon implemented a smart water network using Birdz’s smart water sensors (meters and noise correlators) with LoRa devices. The new water management approach generated significant benefits, a strong use case for LoRa:

• 识别、地理定位水网中的 1,200 处漏水点并更快地修复
• 1 million cubic meters of water saved annually in production due to improved performance of the distribution network
• Overall 8% increase of water network efficiency in four years, from 77% in 2014 to 85.2% in 2018

通过实施由传感器以及基于 LoRa 器件的网关组成的智能计量基础设施，公用事业公司可以更有效地收集数据并简化运营，从而有效降低成本。想深入了解用于智能公用事业的 LoRa？访问 Semtech 网站的智能计量应用页面！

European Utility Week will take place November 12-14, 2019 at the Paris Expo Porte de Versailles in Paris, France. Visit their website to learn more about the conference, its exhibitors and ticket information.

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