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Providing citizens with safe and clean drinking water has been a concern in the Laredo, Texas area for some time. Because they share the Rio Grande water supply with Mexico, Laredo citizens run a greater risk of being exposed to contaminated drinking water. “Water resources in this part of the country are so critical and scarce that it becomes a real core of the entire social and economic infrastructure of the area. So any risk here is more painful than in many other locations,” Project Manager Yakov Shadevich said.

To make this issue more complicated, Laredo’s Water Treatment Plant was built at a time when certain water quality standards weren’t as strict as they are now. When the Laredo City government needed assistance in tightening its water quality standards, CANBERRA offered its system and assistance. CANBERRA teamed with EarthTech, Inc. (Tyco International Company) and SCI, Inc. a local installer and controller manufacturer, to provide the utility and citizens of Laredo with an Early Warning System (EWS) that would warn the local authorities of intentional or accidental contamination of raw water entering the plant from the Rio Grande, as well as the treated clean water leaving the facility.

The CANBERRA team first assembled at the Laredo Jefferson Water Treatment Plant in summer 2006, to put this project together. The project was completed in summer 2007.

The EWS takes the CANBERRA Homeland Security Surveillance System (HS3), a data gathering and camera platform, uses its packages to display data at various locations, and combines its already existing SCADA with an SCI provided SCADA Patch to trigger video-recording. This combination allows the system to establish actual reasons for the water parameter changes. The integrated software allows the system to accept a SCADA data packet from the existing water measurement devices and convert it into a RadNet communications protocol packet. Cameras and alarms are activated through motion detection, water quality sensor data, and RFID triggers. Under sensor and camera alarm conditions, data is sent to the Central control center where it is reviewed and analyzed, secured and stored. Then it is transmitted to a cell phone/PDA provided to the users.

The EWS monitors water quality at a number of locations and monitors facility security. The system triggers video recording in the event that any of the sensors show a distress signal. It features CANBERRA’s software package which displays complete sensor data and shows possible reasons of water contamination and utility intrusion.

The EWS was adapted to the existing water quality sensors at the Laredo facility and added new Endress and Houser manufactured sensors that are all network-ready, using CAT-5 or Fiber Optic Cable.

EWS monitoring sensors and cameras were placed at the Rio Grande River intake location and at the water treatment plant.

CANBERRA's Product Team Leader Greg Shafer said “From what I understand, the system went in pretty easily.” The ease of installation is one of many qualities that makes the HS3 an appealing device. “So far it seems like it is pretty easy to adapt to other systems that people already have,” Shafer said.

The EWS was completed nearly 3 months earlier than anticipated in the contract and under budget.

“Since installation, the system has been functioning impeccably. It survived a near-direct lightning hit and kept generating data as designed,” Shadevich said.