Strata Levies Down the Drain

"If you cannot measure it, you cannot improve it." - Lord Kelvin

A 38 storey residential strata in Sydney recently discovered they were wasting 100,000 Litres of water per day. The picture shows how a resident had placed a bowl in the bathroom sink to reduce the noise created by leaking taps.

The installation of Taggle smart metering devices, monitoring of usage, and repairs to leakage, reduced the buildings water usage by 25%. [full report]

​In many strata buildings the cost of wasted water ends up being shared by everyone. Often there are no individual water meters for the apartments, so the biggest wasters can't be identified.  However, smart meters are increasingly being used to track individual apartment water usage and this allows for the introduction of 'user pays' billing.

Smart water meters allow for remote readings to track water usage. Leaks can be detected by monitoring the water usage of the whole building during off-peak times such as early morning hours where no activity is expected. This is proving to be an effective tool for saving water and money in strata buildings.
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Wattblock water assessment shows 48% savings opportunity. [full report]

​By correctly monitoring water usage in addition to other water saving devices that are becoming increasingly common, utility bills can be reduced and water consumption greatly lowered.

Read more about Taggle's Sydney apartment case study here, and download the results. The Water Group also provides a number of smart metering success stories. Smart metering also recently enabled a Victorian University to identify a leak of 150 Litres per minute costing $700 a day. 

The Australian Water Association has a fact sheet on smart meters. 

Ben Kleeman
Contributor, Strata Energy News