Microsoft

UK | FIDO Plus

Project type

Water replenishment, water stewardship

Client

Microsoft

Project size

220 miles of distribution pipeline

Featured product

FIDO Plus

628m

gallons of water saved in year one

189%

Performance against target

403,975

kg of carbon saved in year one

The challenge

Microsoft is a global corporation with ambitious environmental, social and governance (ESG) goals and a public commitment to become water positive by 2030.

This means replenishing more water than it uses in communities where it has data centers, particularly in stressed watersheds.

One such area was London, where the company wanted to replenish a significant amount of water.

Microsoft wanted to partner with a technology solution which would provide rapid, local and long-lasting community water benefits and deliver volumetric results it could report with confidence.

Attracted by FIDO AI’s unique ability to find and size water leaks using advanced data analysis of pipeline acoustics on large utility water networks, Microsoft approached us to devise a quantifiable water replenishment program in London which conformed with accepted water stewardship reporting standards.

The solution

FIDO Tech worked closely with Microsoft’s water team and its partners to devise a new model for water replenishment which works by helping London’s water utility, Thames Water, quantifiably reduce water loss.

This model, which we called FIDO Plus, uses FIDO AI to identify the largest leaks on a public water network, which we investigate and mark up for repair by Thames’ engineers. FIDO AI is then used to verify the success of repair and we accurate quantify the resulting water savings using flow reduction data.

Early in the project’s development, we realised we needed to meet the standard of reporting outlined in the Volumetric Water Benefit Accounting (VWBA) 2.0 guidelines.

We made sure the water savings achieved by FIDO AI could be independently validated using VWBA. This included guaranteeing water claims by using FIDO AI to continuously monitor the pipeline network following repair work in order to its ongoing integrity and detect new leaks.

Microsoft agreed to fund the FIDO Plus on 350km (around 220 miles) of the London water distribution network owned by Thames Water for a period of ten years.

The results

The company set FIDO a first year objective to save 331,756,245 US gallons of water (1,255,834 megalitres).

By detecting and pinpointing the most significant leaks on the allocated 350km portion of London’s network, FIDO AI was able to identify the largest leaks quickly. These were marked up by FIDO experts without the need for any intervention by Thames Water other than to complete the repair work.

Network flow reductions following each repair that was completed in year one were measured and independently validated using VWBA. A total of 627,753,369 US gallons of water was saved (2,376,305 megalitres), some 189% more than the target.

Because these leaks were additional to those that Thames Water found using its own teams, the volumetric water benefits resulting from FIDO’s work were directly attributable to Microsoft’s support and thus reportable against the company’s water stewardship goals.

An additional projected benefit for the water utility is the increased visibility of the behaviour of the FIDO-AI monitored network over ten years. Continuous monitoring by FIDO AI is expected to provide insight into leak occurrence and degradation rates over time which will help inform business maintenance and investment decision-making.

As a result of the success of the project, Microsoft has initiated further FIDO Plus projects in Arizona, Mexico and Utah.

This first-of-its-kind leak detection technology replenishment project in London with FIDO Tech will reduce water lost to leakage in London’s aging distribution network, leveraging FIDO’s AI-enabled acoustic leak analysis and is expected to save millions of cubic metres of water per year.

Melanie Nakagawa, Chief Sustainability Officer, Microsoft

FIDOPlus is our AI-led water replenishment model for corporations who need to meet water stewardship or security goals at scale. By supporting the deployment of powerful FIDO AI on public water networks, corporates deliver rapid, local, quantifiable water benefits which transparently contribute to both watershed resilience and sustainable business operations.

All water replenishment results are independently verified and validated in accordance with Volumetric Water Benefit Accounting (VWBA) 2.0 guidelines.

icon

Want to scale your water stewardship?

Talk to us about using FIDO Plus