By Peter Marumong, Cluster WWW Segment Leader at Schneider Electric
24 November 2023
The Department of Water and Sanitation’s (DWS) Annual Performance Plan for 2023/24 to 2025/26, published in May 2023, outlined the challenges faced by the South African water sector. These included poor maintenance, recurring droughts driven by climatic variation, inequities in access to water and sanitation, deteriorating water quality and a lack of skilled water engineers.
The above are well-known, each adding to the country’s water crisis challenges. In the case of skilled water engineers, or lack thereof, the challenge is compounded by factors such as an aging workforce, limited educational opportunities, and low industry attractiveness.
Here, automation and technology can provide some relief, and whilst it is not the silver bullet to eliminating the country’s WWW skills shortage, it can provide utilities and operators with the necessary tools to alleviate some of the immediate skills challenges faced by the industry.
Evolution instead of revolution
The marketplace for automation in WWW is mature. These application-centric solutions decouple software from hardware, enabling end users to design adaptable systems that respond to evolving supply and demand-side conditions.
Automation offers native IT/OT integration, thus eliminating the need for complex gateways. This lends itself to a user-friendly system that benefit all stakeholders, including engineers, plant operators, systems integrators, and machine builders.
Furthermore, designs can be virtually simulated and tested before deployment, and once it’s defined as a digital asset, it can be “dragged and dropped” in the user interface. Also, through automation, maintenance and troubleshooting are streamlined as the information remains up to date throughout an asset's lifecycle.
This approach significantly reduces the workload of engineers, control room operators, and maintenance personnel. Access to updated information improves overall uptime and reliability. The mean time to repair (MTTR) is shortened, as technicians no longer need to search through multiple sources for the data they need.
Automation solutions don’t require an all-or-nothing approach. WWW operators can deploy it on smaller scale, preserving current investments and minimising training needs. The "wrap and replace" approach allows existing and new systems to run together, gradually scaling up as financial benefits become apparent.
The role of automation assisting with the current skills gap
Automation technologies offer a viable solution to supplement some of the skills lacking in WWW segment. By integrating automated systems and processes, the need for manual intervention and specialised expertise can be minimised. It offers benefits such as:
- Enhanced Efficiency -automated control systems continuously monitor water treatment processes, optimising parameters and adjusting operations in real-time. This reduces the reliance on skilled personnel to manually oversee complex processes.
- Remote and asset monitoring enable experienced professionals to provide support and guidance to less experienced workers from afar. This virtual collaboration facilitates knowledge sharing and skill transfer, even in geographically dispersed locations.
There is no doubt that automation does offer some compelling solutions, however, investment in skills development must continue to enjoy priority. Ultimately, the integration of automation and skilled personnel will play an important role in ensuring the WWW overcomes some of its most pressing challenges.
