What Does Real-Time Decision Support Look Like In The Plant?

By Tim Braun, Vice President, Enterprise Solutions, Xylem

Wastewater utilities have relied on data to make decisions and manage processes for decades. But too often that data is outdated before it’s actionable. Therefore, even with a wealth of data at their fingertips, many operators have to rely on instinct earned through experience, gut feel, and habit to manage processes and respond to events.

The result is that even the best-run wastewater utility can have inefficiencies and excess costs that are lying just below the surface. Worse, when major events occur, operators react instinctively rather than analytically, often exacerbating the problem they are trying to solve.

Real-time decision support can help mitigate these issues and more by unlocking new value from existing infrastructure, reducing inefficiencies, as well as providing a holistic view of the utility network, its assets, and its operations, thus transforming utility workflows. It empowers utility leaders to declare, “We know what we’re doing, it’s amazing, and we can prove it!”