It is quite clear the remote monitoring of gas consumption is the direction to take. Even if not as wide as for other kind of technologies, the range of intelligent gas meters is increasing nowadays. Now the question arises, how to identify the best gas meter for your business or needs?
How to choose the right Smart Gas Meter
Accuracy and Durability are the parameters we should evaluate and a true rational choice comes from Italy. Its name is Prodigi, a gas meter for residential use. Actually, it’s a Smart meter as it incorporates an ultrasonic sensor and it has IoT capabilities.
Prodigi was completely developed by Mesura Metering Srl, a Cavagna Group company fully focused on the development and production of Gas Meters. Counting on more than 70 years of experience in the gas industry, today Cavagna Group is driving meaningful innovations in the fields of IoT and digitalisation, in order to guarantee the factors mentioned previously.
Ultrasonic flow sensor + Shutoff valve = ACCURACY
Sources tell us that gas utilities in Japan have relied on ultrasonic gas meters since 2005 with great achievements in terms of accuracy and safety. That’s one of the reasons why Mesura Metering decided to install a Japanese ultrasonic flow sensor on its Smart gas meter. Excellent advantages of this choice are there for all to see. In fact, by incorporating a Panasonic’s innovative high-performance sensor, Prodigi uses a static volume measurement technology and therefore guarantees more precise measurement over time.
Based on an ultrasonic principle, the only moving part on this gas meter is the remotely operated SHUTOFF VALVE. The step-motor valve is located in the gas inlet path and allows the gas company to shut off the meter remotely, without the need to physically send a technician.
More accuracy for more safety
This is very useful in different situations. The gas company can stop the gas supply if a customer does not pay the bills, for example. Or, in the case of a disaster, the gas company is not compelled to put its technicians’ life at risk, in order to resolve it.
However, for safety reasons, we always need a technician on site to manually re-open the valve closed remotely. In fact, it is always recommended, or even mandatory, to check there are no gas leaks before reopening the flow.
Certified DURABILITY for high performances
When evaluating which gas meter best meets certain requirements, we can’t forget to consider the durability of the product. In fact, when dealing with gas management, most of the time durability of a device means safety while it is in use.
Besides the remotely controlled shut-off valve, Prodigi has another safety component: its stainless-steel body. That is welded to ensure strength, the external seal and resistance from corrosion (internal and external) both at low and high temperatures.
We find evidence of this in different kinds of tests that the smart gas meter has been stressed to. In order to obtain the compliance with the most important normative requirements, this gas meter passed many mechanical tests such as impact strength and etching. Then, the gas meter body was subjected to an accelerated corrosion test in a neutral salt spray chamber. The sample was immersed continuously for 500 hours in a 5% solution of sodium chloride dissolved in deionised water. At the end of the above tests and a subsequent one lasting 340 hours in a humidistat chamber at 100% relative humidity, the sample was washed, dried with compressed air and evaluated. No appreciable fractures or incisions were found and on a scale of 0 to 5 – where 5 corresponds to 40/50% rusted area – the degree of rusting was less than 1.
IP rating: what it is and how it’s important when we talk about a gas meter
Another important aspect to be considered is the IP rating of the gas meter. IP stands for Ingress Protection and, as per the international standard EN 60529, this rating is used to define levels of sealing effectiveness of electrical enclosures against intrusion from foreign bodies (tools, dirt etc) and moisture. The IP rating is expressed by the means of two numbers, each corresponding to a specific kind of protection. The first number after IP indicates the degree of intrusion protection, and the second one represents the protection level that the casing enjoys from various forms of moisture. The Ultrasonic Smart Gas Meter by Mesura Metering complies to the IP65 enclosure. That means it is fully protected against:
- dust and other particulates – including a vacuum seal, tested against continuous airflow;
- water projected from a nozzle.
In this article, we haven’t been able to highlight all of the important features that Prodigi incorporates. Accuracy and durability are some of the most important ones but that’s not all. Read more in the suggestions below:
>> Smart gas meter for domestic use
>> Gas metering and IoT