Qatium keeps your network model up to date by updating your readings data regularly. This ensures you have accurate insights for better and faster decision-making. In this article, we’ll show you how Qatium handles your data integration.
Update frequency
Qatium updates data from your network’s key assets, like pumps, junctions, valves, and tanks, at specific intervals. In the table below, there’s a breakdown of how often we update different asset variables:
| Asset variable | Asset update frequency |
|---|---|
| Pump status | Every 15 min |
| Pump speed | Every 15 min |
| Valve status | Every 15 min |
| Valve setting | Every 15 min |
| Tank level | Once a day at midnight (00:00). After this first time step, the simulation calculates tank levels for the rest of the day. |
| Junction demands/Consumptions | Every pattern time step (usually every 15 minutes) |
How Qatium adjusts live demands
In Qatium, there are two ways to adjust water demands to reflect real-time data:
- Uploading live data directly using the Ingest API.
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Adjusting demands based on flowmeter readings in different DMAs (zones). For this to work, each zone needs to have some key information:
- Customer points (places where there is water consumption)
- Flowmeter readings
- Zone name or ID
- Inlet and Outlet IDs (the assets where water enters and leaves the zone)
As shown in the table, Qatium adjusts the water demand in each zone every 15 minutes. This is done based on the difference between the amount of water entering and leaving the zone (from the flowmeter readings).
The total flow is then divided among all customer points in the zone, depending on their usual water usage. If a customer point originally has no water usage, it stays the same even after the adjustment.
Special cases for water demand adjustments:
- Readings every 15 minutes, but patterns every hour: Qatium only uses hourly data and ignores any extra data from the 15-minute intervals.
- Patterns with steps shorter than 15 minutes: If water usage patterns are less than 15 minutes, Qatium fills in the missing values. For example, if there's a reading at 00:00 and 00:15, Qatium applies the 00:00 reading to 00:00, 00:05, 00:10, and so on.
- Negative water usage: If the flowmeter shows negative water usage, Qatium skips the adjustment.
- Missing flowmeter data: If there is no flowmeter reading at a specific time, Qatium skips the adjustment for that time in the zone.
What if readings are missing data?
If Qatium doesn’t receive any data for a certain time, it will use the most recent valid data. If no valid data is available, Qatium will skip updates for that specific time step, and the network simulation will continue with the information available.
Time step assignment
Qatium ensures that real-time data is correctly matched with the simulation’s hourly time steps. For instance, data received between 3:00 PM and 3:59 PM will be assigned to the 3:00 PM time step in the simulation, making sure the readings align accurately with your network model.
Handling multiple readings
If we receive multiple readings for the same asset during the same time period, Qatium will select the most recent one. That ensures that your network is working with the latest information available.