News & Analysis
Gecko MCU gets the nod for smart water meter
Colin Holland
2/22/2011 10:19 AM EST
Aquiba, a joint venture between Sentec and Takahata Precision, has selected Energy Micro's EFM32 Gecko microcontroller for use in its A200 smart water meter.
The EFM32G890F128 microcontroller handles the A200's high accuracy flow measurement, data logging, secure communication and application firmware upgrades.
The Aquiba A200 smart water meter has no moving parts and provides good measurement accuracy even at the lowest flow rates and over the product's full service lifespan. To allow water operators to plan for future changes in climate and network infrastructure, the A200 also has the in-built flexibility to enable it to be rapidly adapted to meet future metering requirements.
Mark England, CEO of Sentec said, in designing the A200, "We needed to move to a microcontroller that could give us the 32-bit data processing but at a power consumption that would deliver a battery life of 15 years. What's more, it needed to be able to support our unique operating system and modular software and handle over-the-air field upgrades as well."
The EFM32G890F128 microcontroller handles the A200's high accuracy flow measurement, data logging, secure communication and application firmware upgrades.
The Aquiba A200 smart water meter has no moving parts and provides good measurement accuracy even at the lowest flow rates and over the product's full service lifespan. To allow water operators to plan for future changes in climate and network infrastructure, the A200 also has the in-built flexibility to enable it to be rapidly adapted to meet future metering requirements.Mark England, CEO of Sentec said, in designing the A200, "We needed to move to a microcontroller that could give us the 32-bit data processing but at a power consumption that would deliver a battery life of 15 years. What's more, it needed to be able to support our unique operating system and modular software and handle over-the-air field upgrades as well."
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Sanjib.Acharya
2/22/2011 12:56 PM EST
There are so many 32-bit micro-processors out there...interested to know why was this microprocessor chosen for A200 smart water meter application? Why was this best suited for this application? Is it because of low power consumption? Any specific advantages of using EFM32 Gecko microcontrollers?
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Berenice
2/23/2011 9:15 AM EST
Hi Sanjib,
Our primary reason was the low power consumption which enabled us to implement 'sleep' modes with our operating system.
Other ARM Cortex implementations that we analysed had limitations in their power management which made them unsuitable.
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Hemanth H D
2/24/2011 5:24 AM EST
Hello Sanjib.Acharya,
please provide us your contact details or write to hemanth@omniscientelectronics.com to provide more information on EMF32.
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chanj
2/22/2011 7:51 PM EST
I was envisioning a smart water meter is getting power from water flowing through the valve. Does 32 bits processor sound overkill for this application?
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Berenice
2/23/2011 7:16 AM EST
Hi Chanj,
Although 32 bit may sound like overkill now, our policy at Aquiba and indeed at our parent company Sentec, is to 'futureproof' our technology. In future there will be all sorts of applications for smart water meters that have not been thought of now.
We have provided the ability to upgrade in future, as water companies will not want to buy millions of new meters, but may want to add functionality. (Think of how software requirements on PCs have grown over the years, or phone apps for example).
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DrQuine
2/26/2011 2:18 PM EST
How about adding a leak detection feature? Broken pipes or running toilets have a different consumption pattern from normal usage; a lot of wasted water and money could be avoided with timely alerts.
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