City of Lakeland Improves Flood Prevention Capabilities with IoT Technology from Sensus

Florida utility deploys smart solutions to monitor lake levels

RALEIGH, N.C.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–#IoT–(Click
to Tweet) – For scientists at the City
of Lakeland, Florida, manually monitoring lake levels to prevent
flooding is a time-consuming, resource-draining task, especially during
the nearly four-month rainy season.

“Maintaining balanced water levels is critical to avoid flooding in
residential areas and conserve enough water for the dry season,” said
Laurie Smith, manager of the City of Lakeland’s Lakes and Stormwater
Division. “Our technician has to drive back and forth between 11 lakes
and make sure the levels don’t get too high.”

The city’s staff knew they needed a better way to monitor water levels,
and turned to Sensus,
a Xylem brand, to make this goal a reality using innovative
Internet-of-Things (IoT) technology. Offering unprecedented capabilities
for advanced connectivity, IoT has municipalities and communities
rethinking the potential for using existing and future investments in
technology–such as the FlexNet^®
communication network–to improve the lives of the citizens they
serve.

A long-time Sensus customer, the Lakeland team leveraged their
investment in the FlexNet system to create remote water monitoring
stations at two lakes using the Sensus^®
Smart Gateway sensor interface.

“Our FlexNet system had all we needed to build a remote monitoring
solution, allowing us to reap tremendous cost savings from not having to
implement new infrastructure,” said Smith.

With Smart Gateway and the FlexNet system, the City of Lakeland’s
scientists are now able to collect water level data remotely in real
time. Technicians can identify when lakes are at risk for flooding and
drive directly to the affected lakes to open or close the installed
flood control structures, saving time and operational costs.

“Initially, we weren’t sure if the solution was going to be accurate
enough, but it exceeded our expectations,” said Smith. “We also
appreciate how easy it was to use. We’re lake scientists, not technology
people, and we’ve been able to quickly and seamlessly use the technology
to improve our monitoring capabilities.”

With the successful pilot of the solution at two of the city’s lakes,
the team now looks forward to deploying remote monitoring at the
remaining nine lakes.

“The monitoring process used to take up the majority of our technician’s
time during the work week, but now that time has been reduced
dramatically,” said Smith. “We’re extremely pleased with the results of
the pilot and are looking forward to having this system installed at all
our lakes.”

About Sensus
Sensus helps a wide range of public service
providers—from utilities to cities to industrial complexes and
campuses—do more with their infrastructure to improve quality of life in
their communities. We enable our customers to reach farther through the
application of technology and data-driven insights that deliver
efficiency and responsiveness. We partner with them to anticipate and
respond to evolving business needs with innovation in sensing and
communications technologies, data analytics and services. Learn more at sensus.com
and follow @SensusGlobal on Facebook,
LinkedIn
and Twitter.

About Xylem
Xylem (XYL) is a leading global water technology
company committed to developing innovative technology solutions to the
world’s water challenges. The Company’s products and services move,
treat, analyze, monitor and return water to the environment in public
utility, industrial, residential and commercial building services, and
agricultural settings. With its October 2016 acquisition of Sensus,
Xylem added smart metering, network technologies and advanced data
analytics to its portfolio of solutions. The Company’s nearly 16,000
employees bring broad applications expertise with a strong focus on
identifying comprehensive, sustainable solutions. Headquartered in Rye
Brook, New York with 2015 revenue of $3.7 billion, Xylem does business
in more than 150 countries through a number of market-leading product
brands.

The name Xylem is derived from classical Greek and is the tissue that
transports water in plants, highlighting the engineering efficiency of
our water-centric business by linking it with the best water
transportation of all—that which occurs in nature. For more information,
please visit www.xyleminc.com.

Contacts

For Sensus
Linda Palmer, 919-259-5778
[email protected]
or
Mark
Van Hook, 919-459-6481
[email protected]