DHI Singapore was awarded about S$ 2 million worth of research funds for two proposals so to carry out research and development on improving its product offerings to the global water industry by the Environment and Water Industry, PUB.
The two grants are for the following 2 proposals:
Aquatic Microbial Early Warning System (AMEWS)
Water is one of the most precious resources on the planet and is especially important for Singapore. Not only is it important to have access to water sources, but it is absolutely critical to ensure the biosecurity of those water resources. For example, harmful microorganisms, such as algae, are found naturally in fresh water in low, safe numbers. However, due to environmental changes in the water body (e.g. sunlight intensity, nutrient input, temperature etc), these organisms occasionally bloom up to high numbers and become a health threat, either for human consumers of the water, or in the case of aquaculture, are toxic to the animals being farmed.
Current methods for monitoring for the appearance of such blooms are based on older techniques that can be sensitive and specific. However, they typically have long detection and reporting times and testing is done on an infrequent basis, which often means that once a bloom is detected, it is too late to act. New molecular (e.g. DNA based detection methods) have the capacity to provide much more sensitive and rapid detection.
We propose to develop a monitoring device that can continuously check for the appearance of harmful blooms and that will screen for microorganisms that are particularly relevant to Singaporean waters. The development of the device will be coupled with a comprehensive management plan that is based on a detailed understanding of the environmental conditions that lead blooms of harmful microorganisms. The device will be deployed permanently for monitoring and when a bloom is predicted, it will be possible to implement strategies to minimize the effect of the bloom. This will result in improved water safety for drinking and recreation and will also have significant potential to protect valuable aquaculture crops from loss due to infection by pathogenic organisms and desalination from red-tides.
For further information contact Ole Larsen
Acoustic Mass Meter
The water industry is currently lacking of reliable, precise and easy to use flow meters and sediment concentration measurement devices and for some applications the information about the absolute mass of sediments is missing, too.
Water monitoring techniques that can measure high suspended sediment concentrations are needed to optimize processes in water power and treatment plants. Established methods of collecting sediment data are labor intensive, expensive and may be of unknown accuracy due to the large spatial and temporal variability associated with the transport of suspended sediments. To fill this data void, automatic, cost-effective techniques are needed to collect high quality data on suspended sediment load.
In addition, there is an industry user demand for maintenance-free and high-precision flow meters. Ultrasonic technology will increasingly become the technology of choice not merely an alternative to traditional flow meter technologies. The noncontact and non-intrusive nature of ultrasonic flow technology poses a challenge to the traditional flow meters in process industries.
To overcome these hurdles and to use the benefit of ultrasound based technology the research cooperation between DHI Water & Environment Pte Ltd (Singapore) and HydroVision GmbH (Germany) is aiming to develop a new measurement device, the so called Acoustic Mass-Meter. The technology will comprise of two improved measurement methodologies in order to very accurately determine the velocity of the water flow and the particle concentration in the water with calibration free instruments.
The new three devices, flow meter, sediment meter and mass-meter will help the water industries like power plants and treatment plants to monitor and optimize their processes. Another field application will be the monitoring of sediment transports of river beds, dams and ports caused by nature, ship manoeuvring or dredgers.
For further information contact Thomas Hies