Interview with Richard Fry, Neura Business Manager from Chorus

Imagine being able to get detailed visibility of your water network. Knowing when a wastewater overflow is about to occur, tracking stormwater drainage levels before heavy rain causes flooding, or pinpointing leaks in your water supply network.

That’s the kind of control offered by Neura – the latest IoT smart solution by Chorus and NNNCo.

Neura is a flexible, total IoT solution designed for councils, utilities and businesses to monitor and manage their assets in near real-time. From smart water management to public lighting, waste collection, and more, Neura can help optimise operations, reduce costs and enhance service delivery.

We sat down with Richard Fry, Neura Business Manager, to learn how councils across New Zealand can use Neura to tackle water management challenges while helping improve infrastructure efficiency and sustainability, and reduced costs.

Can you explain what Neura is and how it works to improve water management for councils?

Neura is an Internet of Things (IoT) solution that helps councils monitor their assets and environments. It allows for smarter decision-making through real-time data and alerts.

Councils across New Zealand are facing growing populations and underinvestment in water infrastructure. Many are dealing with significant water losses but don’t know where the issues are or where to invest. Neura’s flexible IoT solution provides the visibility needed to monitor these assets more effectively.

There's also a need to address drinking water quality and residents' water usage, presenting an opportunity for councils to explore user-paid systems.

Neura can help improve the efficiency of truck rolls and responses to issues on your network and remove manual meter reads, enabling accurate billing and leak detection before problems escalate.

What are the top challenges councils face when managing water, and how does Neura’s solution address them?

The main issue is visibility of water management assets, especially with the traditionally high cost of sensors and the difficulty of connecting networks in areas like drains and wastewater. Neura provides affordable connectivity and sensors, helping councils identify faults across networks.

For stormwater, our sensors allow proactive monitoring, letting councils know about blockages or displaced manhole covers. On the drinking water side, we can monitor water quality, send alerts when water is lost and can monitor pressure and flow to prevent larger issues.

For wastewater, we can monitor pumps in near real time, checking for stress or wear before it becomes a bigger problem. We improve visibility across all these systems.

What makes Neura’s IoT network the best fit for water use cases?

Our focus is on connecting assets and environments where needed, even in hard-to-reach places. Neura will purpose build the network where required.

We use LoRaWAN technology, which supports low-powered, long-lasting battery sensors. This is key for things like underground sensors, where frequent replacements aren’t practical. LoRaWAN also offers deep ground penetration. It's part of a global ecosystem, giving customers more choices and competitive pricing.

So where can you build the Neura network and what environments can it cover?

Neura provides connectivity wherever it’s needed. Our sites can cover long distances, which is perfect for open spaces, and LoRaWAN has strong in-ground propagation, ideal for water applications.

Globally, LoRaWAN is proving to be an ideal choice for smart water deployments. For instance, Veolia has deployed over 4 million smart meters in France, and recent deployments in Italy have added over a million sensors underground.

Tell us more about who’s behind Neura. How does the partnership between Chorus, NNNCo, and Neura work?

Neura is a partnership between Chorus and NNNCo – combining Chorus’ network-building expertise with NNNCo’s global IoT know-how. Together, we deliver purpose-built IoT solutions across New Zealand.

NNNCo brings a wealth of experience with deployments in 15 countries across three continents. They’ve worked across sectors like power, water, agriculture, and defence. Neura leverages their global expertise to offer solutions for New Zealand’s needs.

What’s the advantage of having an open, agnostic platform? How does that help councils in the long run?

Neura future proofs and avoids vendor lock-ins, which is a common issue councils face. This is because water meter providers can often lock councils into using specific meters and software, limiting flexibility for wider solutions. Having an open and agnostic solution means councils can easily swap meters or add new use cases like monitoring water quality or street lighting – all on the same platform.

We also have a wide selection of pre-approved sensors allowing for flexible and cost-effective device management. N-tick is a device certification programme that confirms the device will fit our network parameters, as well as the LoRaWAN parameters defined in the LoRawWAN standards. There is the ability to easily get new devices certified through the N-tick process.

What kind of financial benefits can councils expect from adopting smart water metering through Neura?

Globally, we’re seeing around a 25% reduction in water loss when councils deploy a good number of sensors. Additionally, when residents see how much water they’re using, household consumption tends to drop by about 15%.

Councils can also save money by reducing the need for truck rolls to fix leaks, and, by pumping less water, they can reduce electricity costs. Reduced consumption can reduce the requirement for new water infrastructure.

How can Neura help councils meet their sustainability goals while managing infrastructure effectively?

Neura can help councils run their water operations more efficiently, by reducing water losses, providing better management of stormwater and sewer systems, and limiting overflows. Neura also provides automated, digital monitoring, eliminating the need for manual water meter readings.

In a nutshell, Neura provides better visibility and management, that can help councils meet their sustainability goals by reducing their environmental footprint, and make smarter use of infrastructure.

For many councils, the ability to be adaptable is key. Tell us more about Neura’s scalability and flexibility.

Neura’s solutions are designed for scalability beyond just water management. We offer hundreds of pre-approved sensors and a simple process to certify new ones. Our platform handles data from all these devices, making it easy to integrate into existing council systems.

It’s important that councils choose technology that supports broader asset management and monitoring, like lighting or environmental sensors – Neura enables all this on a single platform.

If a council is interested in exploring how Neura can improve their water management, what’s the best way for them to get started?

The best way to start is by checking out our website at www.neura.co.nz, or feel free to contact me at richard.fry@chorus.co.nz. I’d be happy to chat further about how Neura can help you manage your water infrastructure more effectively.