--- title: Follow the pollution – Real time data exposing waterway vandals description: Illegal pollution dumping activities have been identified and traced within problematic industrial estates in Greater Melbourne --- [Latest News Blog ](https://www.awa.asn.au/resources/latest-news) # [Follow the pollution – Real time data exposing waterway vandals](https://www.awa.asn.au/resources/latest-news/publications/follow-the-pollution-real-time-data-exposing-waterway-vandals) Written by [Water Source](https://www.awa.asn.au/resources/latest-news/author/admin) | May 17, 2021 4:06:46 AM ##### Heath Baker, Melbourne Water, Melbourne, VIC, Australia Jason Morris, Iota Services, Frankston, VIC, Australia ## Abstract Using a combination of new and retrofitted existing technology, abnormal flow events caused by illegal pollution dumping activities have been identified and traced to the location of the pollution sources within problematic industrial estates in Greater Melbourne. This unique means of live detection is enabled by the utilisation of two technologies; ‘Advanced BlokAid®’, ultrasonic level/flow sensors with gas detection and rainfall radar overlay capabilities and prototype Arduino low cost, high-resolution data units within the trunk and reticulated drainage systems respectively. ## Introduction The stormwater live monitoring and pollution detection project aims to improve stream water quality within Dandenong Creek by preventing illegal discharges from industrial land areas. One sub catchment area; Old Joes Creek, has been specifically targeted. The program was first established as part of a broader program of works focusing on making significant improvements to the degraded natural waterway, whilst demonstrating best practice sewerage management. Water quality monitoring results (undertaken by CAPIM {Centre for Aquatic Pollution Identification and Management} from 2011 to 2018) identified Old Joes Creek as a major source of heavy metal pollution, amongst a variety of other organic and inorganic pollutants. These results were also used to identify the types of businesses that may be negatively impacting the waterway. Based on the previous work undertaken, there is a broad understanding of the type of contaminants entering Dandenong Creek via the Old Joes Creek industrial catchment. A number of these contaminants are likely to cause alterations in the flow and air environments within the stormwater system, potentially making detection of pollutants possible using this emerging technology. An extensive network of prototype loggers has been installed within the Old Joes Creek catchment, based on the evidence provided by the CAPIM research over the past seven years. These loggers transmit live data back to servers, overlay rainfall data and provide information and alarms about the operating environment of the stormwater system in real time. This information can be interpreted to provide a series of alerts to water corporations and environmental regulators to determine the potential type of contaminant, and the source location allowing faster response time and rapid identification of offenders. ## Year case study was implemented 2018 to 2020 ## Case study detail - Pollution from industiral areas within cities is a significant challenge facing the water industry and environmental regulators. - Recent pollution events originating from industrial areas have caused significant destruction to downstream receiving water bodies, resulting in significant cleanup and remediation costs to the community, and risking public and environmental health. - Live detection of pollution allows agencies to have ‘eyes underground’, enabling pollution dumping to be traced back to the source, causing a significant deterrant to potential offenders. Ultrasonic units (Advanced BlokAid®) is an IoT-enabled technology developed by South East Water to measure sewer levels, derive flow rates and detect change in stormwater system gases. These devices are easily installed in the stormwater drains, and using NB-IoT communications can provide insights and alerts to operators in near-real time. The high resolution data allows changes in the drainage system to be quickly alerted to authorties. Data can also be easily accessed to allow investigation into historic pollution events. Using the ultrasonic devices for stormwater live monitoring and pollution detection is a new application of the technology that has the potential to be replicated on a larger scale for stormwater networks. - For this trial, the ultrasonic units have been deployed to monitor the operating condition of the large diamater trunk infrastructure, where ultrasonic units have an advantage in conditions where debris is likely. - The low cost, high-resolution logers Arduino (developed in partnership with Monash University) units are deployed in high volume, in individual drainage pits, allowing data from hundreds of sources to be fed back in real time about the operation of the drainage system. - The Arduino units are very cost effective (aproxmiately $125 AUD ea), and do not require confined space entry to install. The data is collated on a database and analysed to determine inconsistencies and send alerts about changes to flow patterns against expected in the small diameter reticulated local stormwater network. - Using both technologies together, allows for an ‘army’ of detection sensors monitoring different components of the system. The two systems can be analysed to interrogate data to ensure information is consisent. - The network has been operating sucessfully for eight months, with data received being used to sucessfully identify hotspot areas, which would otherwise have been overlooked as a source of pollution. ## Figures and Tables Figure 1 – Overview of locations of ultrasonic monitoring within trunk drainage network of Old Joes Creek Figure 2 – Images of Advanced BlokAid ultrasonic devices installed in drainage networks Figure 3 – Overview of locations of Arduino loggers located within reticulated drainage network of Old Joes Figure 4 - images of Arduino devices installed in drainage networks [View full post](https://www.awa.asn.au/resources/latest-news/publications/follow-the-pollution-real-time-data-exposing-waterway-vandals) ```json { "@context" : "http://schema.org", "@type" : "BlogPosting", "author" : { "@type" : "Person", "name" : "Water Source" }, "dateModified" : "2021-10-27T15:11:27.662Z", "datePublished" : "2021-05-17T04:06:46Z", "headline" : "Follow the pollution – Real time data exposing waterway vandals", "image" : { "@type" : "ImageObject", "height" : 372, "url" : "https://f.hubspotusercontent30.net/hubfs/14568786/Imported_Blog_Media/Figure-1-%E2%80%93-Overview-of-locations-of-ultrasonic-monitoring-within-trunk-drainage-network-of-Old-Joes-Creek.png", "width" : 557 }, "mainEntityOfPage" : "https://www.awa.asn.au/resources/latest-news/publications/follow-the-pollution-real-time-data-exposing-waterway-vandals", "publisher" : { "@type" : "Organization", "logo" : { "@type" : "ImageObject", "height" : 60, "url" : "/hs/hsstatic/content_shared_assets/static-1.4092/img/default-amp-logo.png", "width" : 60 }, "name" : "Latest News Blog" } } ```