A cloud-based platform designed to elevate the efficiency of industrial and city-scale desalination, water, and wastewater treatment plants is upgrading its solution with an infusion of artificial intelligence.
Pani, based in Victoria, is known for its award-winning flagship product, Zed.
Zed leverages technology to aggregate data from processes, then visualizes, analyzes, and “instructs operators on how to optimize their plant’s performance to save time, resources, and the environment,” according to a statement from the BC firm.
What often happens when operations teams try to improve on key performance indicators like risks, costs, water losses, and emissions, says CEO Devesh Bharadwaj, is that there’s a lot of raw data but no powerful tool to manage and wield all of the raw material.
“These problems often stem from the same root cause,” he says. “There is too much data to process and not enough time or the right tools to help.”
AI bridges this gap.
Providing teams with “critical capabilities through Pani Zed” generates more efficient day-to-day operational decisions “and will help accelerate digital transformation to get treatment plants further along on the roadmap to decarbonization,” according to Bharadwaj.
The solution corrects a lack of digitization that has “contributed to widespread firefighting against daily increasing risks, costs, water supply shortages, and greenhouse gas emissions.”
And as climate change intensifies, Bharadwaj says, there is a need for industrial transformation at an accelerated pace across sectors.
“Only by leveraging the insights of artificial intelligence can we revitalize existing water treatment infrastructure to become more efficient and sustainable,” the company states online.
The software-as-a-service startup is thus addressing “key capabilities that are currently missing from the information stack at plants,” including centralized data access, system-wide diagnostics, anomaly detection, predictive operations, and dynamic optimization.
“Pani Zed takes a holistic approach to water process management, helping plant operators, engineers, analysts, managers, owners, and executives truly understand how their plant is performing at any given time in a way that is relevant to their role,” explains Jason Nichols, Director of Product at Pani. “Zed keeps every member of the operations team aware of opportunities for improvement.”
The recent changes made to Zed “redefine our product and the way plants can adopt it have been implemented to ensure time to value is reduced for all customers,” added Nichols.
Pani Zed can be deployed at any treatment facility at any level of digital maturity around the world.
“With Pani, water treatment facilities of any shape and size can begin their digitization journey and contribute to a more sustainable water future,” says Bharadwaj.
At Zed’s highest tier of service, AI-powered computations identify optimization opportunities for critical metrics like energy consumption, water recovery, chemical usage, and total cost of ownership.
Other BC-based companies bringing tech to water include Delta-based Muddy River and Vancouver’s infinitii ai.
Leave a Reply