Xylem Brand Eyes India with Smart Water Metering

Sensus, an arm of the US-based Xylem Inc, a leading water technology provider, enabling customers worldwide to transport, treat, test and efficiently use water in public utility, residential, commercial, agricultural and industrial settings with presence in 150 countries, is gearing up to tap the large Indian market with its smart water metering devices, said Amit Vaidya, director-India, strategic customer team-EMEA & APAC, Xylem.

The company, which sees India as a strategic market and has been investing in it for the last 5 years, is in talks with a number of civic bodies in different cities across the country. The company is already collaborating with Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) to provide 2,75,000 smart water meters in the first phase over a period of 3 years. The scale of Pune implementation is large, comparable to anywhere in the world. The project will ensure accurate data on billing, identify customer side leaks, manage their network and help reduce non-revenue water.

Significantly, a recent NITI Aayog report, that drew data from 24 of the 29 states in India, has predicted that India’s water crisis is only going to get worse. Nearly 600 million Indians face high to extreme water stress and about 2 lakh people die every year due to inadequate access to safe water. Also, 21 cities are likely to run out of groundwater by 2020. The situation is indeed alarming and it is high time governments and utilities look at solutions that help in not just addressing the crisis but turning it around, the report says.

Water loss in India, at present, is estimated to be 40-50 percent and Sensus, the brand from the Xylem stable, is working towards bringing this down to 15 percent over the next couple of years, said Vaidya, adding that the company is committed to ‘solving water’ by creating innovative and smart technology solutions to meet the world's water, wastewater and energy needs.

The company sees schemes like AMRUT, as a likely game changer as it encourages municipal bodies across India to invest in smart distribution networks with the aim of delivering 24X7 clean water to people. Municipal bodies/water utilities in India are increasingly seeing the larger positive picture of how with the use of smart water meters and cutting edge technology solutions, they would be able to significantly cut down on non-revenue water, he said.