Atmos International (Atmos) has detected and alerted a leak event on a water utility’s rising main pipeline shortly after monitoring commenced, enabling early visibility of the incident and helping to limit the potential environmental impact.
An Atmos AWAS unit was installed on the pipeline in November, with live alarms enabled shortly afterwards. In December, the system automatically generated a high priority leak alarm only 13 minutes after the onset of the leak, followed by an email alert between Atmos and the utility’s response team.
Without automated monitoring, awareness of leaks on rising mains can depend on reports from the public. Where these occur outside normal working hours it can lead to a delay in reporting and action being taken.
The rising sewer main is situated close to a local watercourse, where uncontrolled failures can escalate into pollution incidents.
Atmos system data showing the pressure drop and automated high priority leak alarm at the point of failure
Martin Duff, Business Development Director for water at Atmos said: “Rising sewer mains across the industry lack live leak detection monitoring, which means operators only become aware of issues once the situation has already escalated. Events like this underline the importance of having reliable, real-time insight on critical assets before failures become more severe.”
Early identification of the issue helped limit the potential severity of the incident. Analysis of the system data also provided insight into elevated transient pressure activity on the pipeline, which may have increased stress on the asset. Continuous monitoring of these conditions can help operators identify potential operational risk factors that cause leaks and support more informed management of critical wastewater infrastructure, particularly in environmentally sensitive locations.
Early detection and rapid response are critical for rising mains operating in environmentally sensitive locations
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