Park Water Company Receives EPA IDSE Compliance Using MWH Soft’s InfoWater Modeling Solution

Long recognized for its market leadership in the large utility industry, MWH Soft, a leading global provider of environmental and water resources applications software, today announced that its flagship GIS-centric product, InfoWater Suite, has been used to effect a new modeling breakthrough in water quality regulatory compliance.

Park Water Company (PWC), an investor-owned public water utility, leveraged the power of InfoWater to quickly and reliably develop and calibrate a comprehensive extended period simulation (EPS) model of its drinking water distribution systems to achieve effective regulatory compliance at minimal costs.

PWC provides quality drinking water via 800 miles of water mains to a population of 200,000 in Los Angeles and San Bernardino Counties in California and Missoula, Montana. PWC used InfoWater Suite to develop a detailed, comprehensive, and well-calibrated dynamic model of its Los Angeles County drinking water infrastructure systems. The rigorously calibrated model was able to adequately match all measured flows, pressures and tank levels within outstanding accuracies of 5.5%, 6.2% and 3.8%, respectively.

The model was then used to quickly and easily identify compliance monitoring sites, a critical step in complying with Initial Distribution System Evaluation (IDSE) requirements under the USEPA Stage 2 Disinfectants and Disinfection Byproducts Rule (Stage 2 DBPR). (IDSE is the methodology used to establish key monitoring locations that best reflect representative high Total Trihalomethane (TTHM) and Haloacetic Acids (HAA5) concentration levels in a water distribution system.) The excellent modeling results were quickly accepted by both the EPA and the California Department of Health Services, resulting in savings of $50K in laboratory costs to PWC.

“I have used MWH Soft’s products since the late 1990’s starting with H2ONET Version 2.5. Now that the software integrates seamlessly with GIS, it has increased the value and versatility in true geocentric modeling, making MWH Soft’s InfoWater Suite and ESRI’s ArcMap a winning combination,” said Aaron J. Gutierrez, GIS Coordinator for PWC in Downey, California. “The software’s speed, robustness and comprehensive, easy-to-use feature set equip us to tackle any demanding hydraulic and water quality analysis, helping us meet the new challenges of the Stage 2 DBPR. MWH Soft’s exceptional technical support and customer care add to its value.”

Unlike competing products, InfoWater’s innovative GIS-centric network modeling technology addresses every facet of water utility infrastructure management and protection — delivering the highest rate of return in the industry. Drawing on the world’s most advanced numerical computation and object-component geospatial technologies, it effortlessly reads GIS datasets; corrects network topology problems and data flaws; extracts pertinent modeling information; and automatically constructs, skeletonizes, loads, calibrates and generates credible network models with astounding speed. Once calibrated models have been established, users can easily run and simulate various hydraulic and water age (water quality) scenarios, identify average residence time and high TTHM and HAA5 locations, and develop an optimal IDSE monitoring plan to achieve regulatory compliance.

“Our proven state-of-the-art geocentric modeling technology has become an indispensable tool for the water utility industry, allowing users to get up to speed right away, be effective across the enterprise, and achieve high-quality results and maximum savings in record time,” said Paul F. Boulos, Ph.D, President and COO of MWH Soft. “This gives them an unbeatable competitive advantage. Seeing progressive utilities like PWC choose MWH Soft as their solution partner is the best possible confirmation of our software’s value. We’re very proud to know that our software applications are playing a critical role at many of the world’s best-run utility companies of every size, helping them quickly achieve regulatory compliance, meet their corporate and strategic goals, and achieve world-class performance at breakthrough savings.”