For three days, experts will address such innovative and important topics in the integral water cycle as digitalization and energy efficiency, key to promoting sustainability.

The Summer Course 'The road to sustainability in the water sector: intelligent management and energy efficiency' was inaugurated this Tuesday.directed by Ana Agüera and José Vicente Colomina.

The course has speakers of the highest quality from industry, academia and public management, with recognized national and international prestige. Debate will be encouraged with round tables to encourage audience participation and visits will be made to industrial and R&D&I facilities.

The Vice Chancellor for Research of the UAL, José Antonio Sánchez, presided over the inauguration of this third course organized together with the Aqualia Chair of the Water Cycle. "From the UAL we are very pleased with the relationship we have with Aqualia and the City of Almeria in everything we carry out in training, dissemination and transfer".

In addition, he stressed that this course "delves into the concern that exists from the University of Almeria and the business world on water management. A problem that is pressing at this time in Spain, in general, and in Almeria, in particular. But we are extremely lucky that in Almeria there are no restrictions because the work has been done in advance. We have been working intensively well in advance on efficient water management and that has prevented us from having restrictions in our city today.d. The sources have been diversified, the supply network has been optimized and this has allowed us today to reduce water consumption in the city by 50 percent compared to 30 years ago, when the population has increased by 25 percent in this time. These are significant and important figures. This course is focused on highlighting the previous work to optimize the water resources we need".

Antonio Urdiales, councilman delegate of the Area of Environmental and Energy Sustainability of the City of Almeria has highlighted the importance of the theme of this course. The water cycle is tremendously important, not only the water supply and ensure in times of drought that we all have water, but also water purification, water regeneration to generate new opportunities. In this course we are going to learn about this efficient management of resources thanks to the great panel of experts who are going to come".

For his part, Santiago Lafuente Pérez-Lucas, Director of Aqualia España, indicated that for the company he manages "sustainability is a continuous task". He also pointed out that digitalization contributes to it. "It allows us to know where each drop of water is at all times. We no longer have to go out to the street to look for breakdowns, we are alerted by the computer systems and that allows us to make an early action and repair breakdowns at the same time they occur and not lose water, which is the goal that is sought." Finally, he stressed that Almeria is an example of sustainability in water management, when it was still not even spoken of. "In Almeria consumption is something that is in society and in the collaboration between the agricultural and urban sector in water management. It is something permanent. And it is other cities that have joined a challenge that Almeria has always had at the center of its way of thinking."

Finally, José Vicente Colomina, director of the course, explained that "with the Aqualia Chair what we want is to give visibility to a sector that goes unnoticed during the winter, when there are no water problems. That is when we are working. Bringing the water cycle closer to the public is fundamental, especially at a time of extreme drought like the present. I am very proud of the winning tandem between the University and the City Council to continue producing water while being sustainable and maintaining the economy, jobs and all the environmental commitments so that we are clear about the value of water".

Papers

Throughout the first day Ramiro Angulo, Secretary General of Water of the Junta de Andalucía, participated in the presentation 'Present and future of water in Andalusia'. In it, he explained that the current situation in Andalusia is very worrying, especially in the Axarquia area of Malaga and the Levante Almeriense, "In the latter case due to issues unrelated to the drought, such as having the Almanzora reservoir closed and, above all, not having repaired the Bajo Almanzora desalination plant. If this had not happened, the water situation of the area would be very different. Therefore, I believe that the situation we have in Almeria is good thanks to the conventional resources (desalination and water regeneration) that allow us to be a little more independent from meteorological drought than other basins".

This situation shows that in order to "manage water resources, the first thing we have to do is to build infrastructures, taking into consideration that at least the water needed to supply the population is reached". As for the future, the speaker sees it as "hopeful through the Hydrological Plan approved last week "contains measures to incorporate new conventional resources in different parts of Andalusia to improve efficiency".

In the afternoon, Bartolomé Marín, head of the Desalination and Reuse Department in Aqualia's Water Engineering and Technology Department, will give a lecture on 'Application of intelligent management tools in the production of new water sources: desalination and reclaimed water'.'. "I am going to talk about the generation of a digital twin for a desalination or water reclamation plant. This digital twin is the plant itself built virtually, using BIM methodology, prior to physical construction. The benefits of this digital twin are that possible design errors are easily seen in 3D before the physical execution. Thus, this 3D design with BIM methodology will help in its construction, substantially improving the planning of the work and its cost control".

The advantages of this digital twin do not end in the construction phase, "but it begins a new stage called 6D and 7D where the digital twin comes to life. and is a true reflection of how the plant operates. At this point, Machine Learning technology can be applied and provide the plant with some artificial intelligence, which will result in a better exploitation of the asset".

Original source / published in: https://www.aenverde.es