Toowoomba Regional Council (TRC) will soon begin the installation of about 22,000 smart water meters throughout the Region.
As part of the rollout of 66,000 meters in total, TRC Water and Waste Committee Chair Cr Rebecca Vonhoff said the meters would start being installed from March.
“This is a significant shift from how we read water meters,” Cr Vonhoff said.
“The digital reading of these smart water meters will provide residents with analytics that will alert them and our team to any significant spikes in usage.
“With this data, we’ll be able to identify prospective leaks which will help us save valuable water.
“From the initial trial of almost 2000 smart meters, it was identified there was about 12% of water loss in the network. These new smart meters will help us to improve our system so we can reduce this loss of water.
“In addition to the new water meters, residents will be able to download an App to monitor their own usage.”
One of the residents who was part of the trial, Greg Johnson, said the App was a good way to check water consumption remotely.
“The App is a beauty and does precisely what I hoped it would,” he said.
“It includes hourly and daily tracking of water usage, leak alerts and tips to lessen water consumption. The meter readers will no longer have to worry about dogs, redback spiders and snakes hounding them.
“It also laid to rest my long held fear of a water leak, as when I was away it recorded zero usage.”
The cost of the project, which includes the installation, operation and maintenance, is estimated to be $27,650,000 in total over a seven-year contract with the majority of meter installations staged over the next three years. The scope of the project expanded to cover an increase in the number of smart meters to be implemented, maintenance services and the smart meter brand.
Council approved the full implementation of the Smart Water Metering Solution across all water connections in the Toowoomba Region at the Ordinary Meeting of Council on 15 November 2022.
At a subsequent Special Meeting of Council on 16 November 2022, Council resolved to seek dollar matching financial support from the State Government relating to the provision of a contribution towards funding for its Smart Water Meter Program, to assist in building a more resilient and efficient water network.
