Automated Piezometer Installation
Installed over 200 automated vibrating wire piezometers to monitor groundwater, canal and pond levels
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The Challenge
- Monitoring system upgrade
- Automate existing pore pressure wells and sump pumps
- Design to withstand hurricane winds
Florida Power and Light wanted to update, repair, and automate the monitoring system around the 18-mile perimeter dike that impounds the Plant Martin Cooling Pond.
The purpose of the geotechnical instrumentation program was to provide accurate measurements of pore water pressures internal to the dam and its foundation and adjacent river and pond levels.
Monitoring data are then used as a warning system to alert staff of unacceptable groundwater conditions at the facility to aid the assessment of stability and safety of site operations.
The Solution
The primary objective was to automate data collection on over 200 existing pore pressure monitoring wells and 32 sump pump stations that FPL personnel had been reading and controlling manually. With automation, FPL was able to reduce the costs to collect and manage data, reduce maintenance, reduce human error, and improve the flexibility to read instruments at different frequencies.
The provided system automatically transfers instrumentation readings directly into FPL’s existing data management system. Geocomp assessed functionality and integrity of each piezometer in addition to repairing or replacing components that were determined to be non- functional. Our team designed, built, programmed, and installed a complex data logging and communications network and executed a communication test program to assess signal strength across distances exceeding 8 miles.
Over 82 new data logger stations with enclosures were designed to withstand hurricane winds. Software to integrate the data into FPL’s existing SCADA system was provided, part of which was used to control dewatering wells at the toe of some parts of the long impoundment.
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