High Tide Technologies Tackles New Challenge While Setting Up SCADA Monitoring System in Carbondale, IL - Case Study
The city`s outdated lift station alarm dialers are upgraded to SCADA, greatly increasing monitoring capabilities
- Location: Carbondale, Illinois
- Products: HTT-1100, HTT-3100
- Distributor: Municipal Equipment Company - St. Louis
Proud home of Southern Illinois University, the city of Carbondale serves a population of approximately 26,000 people, utilizing two wastewater treatment plants in the process. The Southeast plant was last upgraded in 2005 from a 3.19 mgd average flow to 6 mgd with 12.5 mgd max flow. The Northwest plant has a capacity of 2.64 mgd average flow with a 6.6 max mgd flow.
In 2016, the city was using four channel phone dialers to alert personnel to high-level, low-level power/phase fail, and backup system active conditions at each station. According to Sean Pickford, P.E., Carbondale’s city engineer, the components to the city’s existing phone dialer system were outdated and not fully functioning at some stations. Additionally, the city was limited to checking run times on the lift station control panels. “They needed to run out there every day and check run times on the hour,” said Derrick Brandt, aftermarket sales at Municipal Equipment Co. in St. Louis.
The failing alarm dialers prompted the city to consider upgrading its lift station alarms to a SCADA monitoring system. Cost was a key factor in deciding to make the change. “For the same price as our controller, we knew we could get a modem system for around that same price,” Pickford said. “It was a no-brainer, since these type of systems offer a lot more flexibility.”
The city vetted multiple replacement systems.
One important consideration was that the city needed a system that would dial to a landline. “That was a necessity,” Pickford said. “Our operators are not carrying a cell phone on them and don’t use email for work, so [the system] had to be able to call the plant and let them know that there was an issue.”
The city of Carbondale decided to upgrade its system to High Tide Technologies in March 2016. The solution that High Tide offered had the ability to dial to a landline to annunciate an alarm, a feature other competitor products did not have. The overall project cost of using High Tide was also as little as one-third of the cost of other systems, Brandt said.