Drinking water supply system with groupwise control, method for controlling the same, and computer program

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11680392-B2
Application number	US-201816753835-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Oct 9, 2018
Priority date	Oct 9, 2017
Publication date	Jun 20, 2023
Grant date	Jun 20, 2023

Abstract

The invention relates to a drinking water supply system including a drinking water line system, a plurality of drinking water withdrawal points connected to the drinking water line system, at least one sensor which is designed to determine measuring values, a central control device which is designed to receive and evaluate the measuring values determined by the at least one sensor, a plurality of decentralized control elements which are designed to influence at different locations in the drinking water supply system one or more properties of the water guided in the drinking water supply system, wherein the central control device is designed to control the control elements for influencing the one or more properties of the water guided in the drinking water supply system, and wherein a plurality of control elements are or can be combined to form a virtual group.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A drinking water supply system comprising:
a drinking water piping system,
a plurality of drinking water tapping points connected to the drinking water piping system,
at least one sensor configured to determine measurement values,
a central control device configured to receive and evaluate the measurement values determined by the at least one sensor,
a plurality of decentralised control elements configured to influence one or a plurality of properties of water carried in the drinking water supply system at different portions of the drinking water supply system, and
a plurality of decentralised control devices, wherein each of the plurality of decentralised control devices are connected to one or more of the plurality of decentralised control elements for control thereof,
wherein the central control device is configured to actuate the plurality of decentralised control elements to influence the one or the plurality of properties of the water carried in the drinking water supply system,
wherein the central control device is configured to (i) receive a user input assigning at least two of the plurality of decentralised control elements to a virtual group, (ii) combine the at least two of the plurality of decentralised control elements to form the virtual group comprising the at least two of the plurality of decentralised control elements based on the received user input, and (iii) actuate the at least two of the plurality of decentralised control elements that form the virtual group when a virtual group actuation command is received to actuate the virtual group, and
wherein the at least two of the plurality of decentralised control elements are connected to different decentralised control devices of the plurality of decentralised control devices.

2. The drinking water supply system according to claim 1 , wherein the central control device is configured to actuate the at least two of the plurality of decentralised control elements of the virtual group, according to an actuation plan comprising the virtual group actuation command predefined for the at least two of the plurality of decentralised control elements that form the virtual group when the virtual group actuation command is received to actuate the virtual group.

3. The drinking water supply system according to claim 2 , wherein the actuation plan contains a plurality of the virtual group actuation command for different control elements of the plurality of decentralised control elements, and the central control device is configured to actuate one or more of the plurality of decentralised control elements according to the actuation plan when the virtual group actuation command is received to carry out the actuation plan.

4. The drinking water supply system according to claim 1 , wherein
the drinking water piping system has a drinking water line,
a group of the plurality of drinking water tapping points is provided which are connected to the drinking water line,
a plurality of decentralised sensors is provided which are configured to determine information about a performance of flushing operations at drinking water tapping points of the group of the plurality of drinking water tapping points, and
the central control device is configured to control the performance of flushing operations at individual drinking water tapping points of the group of the plurality of drinking water tapping points as a function of the information about the performance of the flushing operations at drinking water tapping points of the group of the plurality of drinking water tapping points.

5. The drinking water supply system according to claim 1 , wherein
one or a plurality of decentralised sensors are provided which are configured to determine information about a performance of flushing operations in a predefined section of the drinking water piping system, and
the central control device is configured to monitor a time since a last flush in the predefined section of the drinking water piping system and to cause a flush in the predefined section of the drinking water piping system when a predefined maximum time is exceeded.

6. The drinking water supply system according to claim 1 , wherein the central control device is configured to control the plurality of decentralised control elements as a function of the received measurement values.

7. A method for controlling the drinking water supply system according to claim 1 , comprising:
receiving the measurement values, in particular the measurement values for one or different properties of water carried in the drinking water supply system, and
controlling the drinking water supply system as a function of the received measurement values,
wherein the virtual group actuation command to actuate the virtual group is received and the at least two of the plurality of decentralised control elements of the virtual group are actuated, and
wherein the at least two of the plurality of decentralised control elements are connected to different decentralised control devices of the plurality of decentralised control devices.

8. A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising instructions that when executed by at least one processor of a control device of the drinking water supply system cause the at least one processor to initiate a performance of the method according to claim 7 .

9. The drinking water supply system of claim 1 , wherein the plurality of decentralised control elements comprise flushing units that, when actuated, flush and/or drain water from the different portions of the drinking water supply system.

10. The drinking water supply system of claim 1 , wherein the plurality of decentralised control elements comprise at least one of an actuable pump or an actuable flow control valve configured to influence water flow through the different portions of the drinking water supply system.

11. The method according to claim 7 , wherein the virtual group actuation command to actuate the virtual group comprises a command to actuate the virtual group according to an actuation plan comprising actuation commands predefined for the at least two of the plurality of decentralised control elements that form the virtual group, wherein the at least two of the plurality of decentralised control elements that form the virtual group are actuated according to the actuation commands.

12. The method according to claim 7 , further comprising initiating control of the drinking water supply system with the central control device.

13. The drinking water supply system according to claim 1 , wherein the central control device is further configured to:
receive the measurement values, in particular the measurement values for one or different properties of water carried in the drinking water supply system, and
control the drinking water supply system as a function of the received measurement values,
wherein the virtual group actuation command for actuating the virtual group is received and the at least two of the plurality of decentralised control elements of the virtual group are actuated, and
wherein the at least two of the plurality of decentralised control elements are connected to different decentralised control devices of the plurality of decentralised control devices.

Assignees

• Viega Tech Gmbh & Co Kg

Inventors

• Kramer Markus
• Schauer Christian
• Otto Christian
• Steger Patrick
• Löher David
• Winterholler Arthur

Classifications

• E03C1/02

  Plumbing installations for fresh water · CPC title

• E03B7/075 Primary

  Arrangement of devices for control of pressure or flow rate · CPC title

• E03B7/074

  Arrangement of water treatment devices · CPC title

• E03B7/045

  diverting initially cold water in warm water supply · CPC title

• G01N33/1826

  Organic contamination in water · CPC title