The challenge

With minimal summer rainfall and limited water storage capacity, the 450-strong population of Murray – or Mer – Island, in the Torres Strait north of Queensland, had lived with severe water restrictions for more than 20 years.

As well as having a challenging geography and small economy, the island’s water network is largely unmapped and was known to be losing between six and seven litres per second.

Even with expensive desalination costing up to $1,700 every day, daily household water supplies were reduced to just six hours.

Meanwhile, lack of knowledge on the exact location, configuration and condition of buried water infrastructure made it more difficult to identify, pinpoint and rectify leaks.

The FIDO AI Solution: 

As part of an integrated approach to acoustic detection, FIDO AI was deployed by Assetlife Alliance, through its links with FIDO’s regional partner Detection Services.

FIDO AI is sensor agnostic and is easy to deploy on any network. It automatically uploads data and analyses files in seconds to more than 92% accuracy. This eliminated the need to train the limited human resource at Torres Strait Island Regional Council.

What we achieved: 

As one part of an integrated strategy that incorporated multiple technologies, FIDO AI helped reduce water leaks to around 0.6 litres per second, a reduction of more than 90%.

Demand was made sustainable and water restrictions have been entirely lifted for the first time in over 20 years.

By using FIDO, the council learned that previous assumptions that a few large leaks were the cause of their water loss were inaccurate as it was caused by an accumulation of smaller leaks. This knowledge will aid resource prioritization and planning in the future.