7 Signs of a Lack of Intelligent Data Insight in Sanitation

Imagine a day-to-day life without an integrated visualization tool for critical points: teams try to find leaks without data support, reports are manually compiled on fragile spreadsheets, expansion decisions are based on outdated maps, and customer complaints are evaluated without any prior diagnosis. As a result, managers end up constantly putting out fires without intelligent data insights.

If this sounds familiar, learn about the 7 recurring problems that a Sanitation Heat Map solves and discover why your operation needs intelligent data visualization.

1. Delay in diagnosing leaks

Leaks are only noticed after user complaints or loss spikes, leading teams to scour the network blindly and delay diagnostics for hours or even days. Therefore, without a dashboard that combines pressure, hydraulic load, and location, each inspection requires manual measurements and additional trips. With intelligent data visualization, pressure drops and load variations quickly appear on the map, guiding immediate interventions and drastically reducing losses.

2. Difficulty processing large volumes of data

Without a platform that consolidates all records generated by the network, managers resort to massive spreadsheets and fragmented systems. Consequently, in this back-and-forth of manually exporting data and adjusting formulas, human error is inevitable. This rework delays strategic decisions, hinders data comparison, and causes anomaly patterns to be hidden amidst the volume.

3. Failure to prioritize critical areas

When there's no clear mechanism for ranking the areas that require the most intervention, you distribute resources generically and risk leaving vulnerable points unattended. This scenario wastes time and high costs, in addition to allowing more serious failures to go undetected. An intelligent view of the data makes it easier to organize areas according to risk level, ensuring that the maintenance team acts first where the impact is greatest.

4. Lack of traceability of the Minimum Nighttime Flow Rate

It's like only discovering a health problem during annual checkups: for example, your flow rate should drop to almost zero at night, but it remains high, and you'd never know it without a system capable of tracking and displaying this metric on a dashboard. The lack of traceability means this deviation is only noticed when losses have already reached critical levels and high costs appear in monthly reports.

With smart visualization, this “symptom” is automatically highlighted. In systems like Ada, scheduled alerts trigger notifications whenever the VMN deviates from the expected pattern, converting raw data into accurate warnings.

5. Unknown distribution sectors

When the boundaries between supply sectors are unclear, meters and sensors from different zones end up overlapping in the same area. The result is that one point may receive excess water while the neighboring one experiences a drop in pressure. Without a platform that combines the network map with data from each sector, it's impossible to visualize which regions belong to which zone, identify faults, and plot the perimeters of each sector.

6. Lack of integrated history

With fragmented historical data, comparing periods requires exporting spreadsheets and manually merging information. Therefore, a dashboard that brings together the entire history of each sector in an interactive map facilitates trend analysis and supports proactive decisions.

7. Uncorrelated pressure and hydraulic load oscillations

If pressure and load data appear misaligned, with pressure spikes without a corresponding increase in demand, or vice versa, you can't identify whether the problem is structural, operational, or external. Therefore, without a view that combines both indicators, diagnoses are inaccurate, and the team operates by trial and error.

Conclusion

Recognizing these signs is the first step to transforming your operation. Therefore, without intelligent data insights, managers continue to operate in the dark, reacting to problems only after they've already caused significant losses.

Investing in a platform that consolidates maps and continuous alerts allows you to move from reactive to proactive mode: more agile teams, faster diagnoses, and surgical interventions in the areas that really matter.

If you're looking to transform raw information into targeted actions, in the ebook "Heat Maps in Sanitation: From Theory to Application," we detail how to implement all this intelligence, with case studies and practical tips.

Download the full eBook and see how to apply this vision in practice: