Customer Story

Preventing three failures, saving £748K, and ensuring operational resilience.

SAM4 was deployed across 637 critical pumps in a phased program. The system detected three potential failures — cavitation, airlock, and pump seizure — preventing pollution incidents and saving £748,000.

£0K

Saved

637

Pumps Monitored

Failures Prevented

750

Asset Target

Overview

Committed to reducing pollution and improving resilience

Southern Water is committed to reducing pollution incidents and improving infrastructure resilience. SAM4 was deployed in a phased program — 250 assets in wave one, 500 in wave two — to provide early warnings on their critical pumping infrastructure.

The organization operates hundreds of submersible sewage pumps across its network. These assets are submerged, inaccessible, and require new approaches to monitor their health reliably.

The Challenge

Submersible pumps running blind

Southern Water operates hundreds of submersible sewage pumps across its network. These assets are submerged, inaccessible, and impossible to monitor with conventional vibration sensors. Without real-time visibility, failures such as cavitation, airlock, and clogging went undetected until they caused pollution incidents or emergency callouts.

The financial and regulatory exposure from a single pollution event can reach hundreds of thousands of pounds. Traditional condition monitoring approaches—which require sensors on the asset itself—simply cannot work in a wet well environment.

The Solution

ESA monitoring from the motor control cabinet

SAM4 was installed at the motor control cabinet for each pump — no sensors in the wet well, no divers, no shutdowns. The system's AI models learned each pump's normal electrical signature and began flagging deviations.

Three detections followed in quick succession: cavitation on one site, a double airlock on another, and a recurring airlock at a third location. Each time, the operations team responded before damage or pollution occurred.

This approach enables continuous monitoring without any infrastructure changes, making it ideal for critical hidden assets.

[Image Placeholder: ESA Monitoring Setup]

The Results

Three detections. Zero pollution incidents.

£748K

Estimated Cost Savings

Derived from preventing three pollution incidents on a worst-case scenario basis.

Failures Detected

Cavitation, double airlock, and recurring airlock — all caught before failure caused environmental impact.

100%

Alert Response Rate

Every alert was acted on in time, preventing environmental incidents and regulatory penalties.

Samotics offers us an innovative perspective on our assets, unveiling insights into previously hidden situations. This newfound visibility empowers us to make informed, proactive decisions that significantly improve our maintenance efficiency.

Austin Phillips Operational Capex Implementation Manager, Southern Water

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