Gurgaon: MCG is planning to establish its first micro data centre for digitising the city’s water supply system and its assets. The proposed facility will integrate GIS mapping, artificial intelligence, Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems and sensors to monitor water assets across the city in real time.Officials said the initiative is inspired by advanced water management technologies in Israel, known globally for its efficient water systems. Under the project, District Metered Areas (DMAs) will be set up, which will allow authorities to track how much water is supplied, how much is consumed, and how much is lost due to Non-Revenue Water (NRW), including leakages and theft. DMAs are clearly defined zones within a city’s water distribution network where the flow of water is continuously measured and monitored.By isolating these zones, authorities can accurately track how much water enters an area, how much is consumed, and how much is lost due to leakages or theft, helping reduce non-revenue water and improve supply efficiency.“GIS will collect data from all our assets, and ownership and usage will be monitored systematically. By dividing the city into DMAs, we can precisely identify losses and inefficiencies,” MCG commissioner Pradeep Dahiya explained, adding that the centre will help with automated maintenance of the water supply and distribution infrastructure.Initially, the centre will focus on water, but officials indicated that the data infrastructure could later be extended to other civic services such as sewerage and utilities.The centre of excellence, which is expected to be implemented over a two-year timeline, is being positioned as a long-term investment in smart city infrastructure. Once operational, it will provide actionable insights for planners, engineers, and policymakers, helping streamline services and optimise resource use.The micro data centre will record detailed information about every colony, sector, pocket, and street in the city. The data centre will clearly show the thickness of water pipelines in each street, how many valid connections exist there, and how many litres of water are supplied daily. The corporation started collecting data available with GMDA and the canal department for this plan, to monitor the flow from main water sources to the end consumer.The civic body also allocated a unique ID to all boosting stations and tubewells in the city. Through the ID, the corporation will have records of how many motors are installed at each station and what their capacity is. Special sensors are being installed on all motors. If a motor breaks down at any station or there is a disruption in the power supply, an alert will immediately sound at the micro data centre. This will allow officials to know about the fault even before field staff report it.There are often complaints that water pressure is low in some areas while water flows in the streets elsewhere. To solve this problem, the corporation will install flow meters at every boosting station. The entire network will be connected to the SCADA system. This technology will help control valves in pipelines across the city from a centralised data centre and monitor pressure. After Israel, the MCG top officials recently visited Odisha, where 24/7 water supply is provided through similar micro data centres in 11 cities.
