What is water tank level monitoring system?

A water tank level monitoring system is a comprehensive solution that integrates software and hardware to receive telemetry data from overhead, open-top, and underground water tanks. These systems utilize IoT devices and various connectivity options, such as Wi-Fi, LoRaWAN, NB-IoT, cellular, and radio networks, to transmit data to a central system or cloud-based platform. IoT sensors can be installed either inside or outside the tank. The system is configured with low/high thresholds to generate alerts and send notifications via SMS, email, or push notifications to mobile devices, tablets, or PCs. The primary objective of a water tank monitoring system is to enable effective real-time resource management.

Every business aims to prevent water spills, leaks, and turbidity while maintaining essential parameters like pH level, temperature, TDS (Total Dissolved Solids), and conductivity. These systems are increasingly popular across industrial, commercial, and residential applications. A TLM (Tank Level Monitoring) system monitors tank contents, checking for overfilling or underutilization, which helps businesses maximize tank efficiency and save money. Water tank level control systems are versatile and applicable in various settings.

• Water & Wastewater industry. The primary goal of wastewater management is to achieve water purity through methods such as settling, filtration, and screening. In this context, IoT sensors monitor all critical information related to water quality.
• Agriculture. Farmers use TLM systems to monitor water tanks in the field, which serve as essential water sources for irrigation, especially when natural water sources and rainfall are insufficient.
• Food & Beverage. In the food and beverage industry, tanks are used to store consumer products like drinking water, milk, cooking oil, and various dyes. IoT monitors help manufacturers track both the volume and quality of liquids stored in these tanks.

Smart water tank level monitoring system

Let’s take a closer look at a smart tank level monitoring system. Smart TLM allows track not only water tank but also a pump. Today most of IoT sensors developed to track water tank data in almost any weather conditions. All types of IoT devices resolve the one main thing – read content in water tank.

There are a few widely used types of IoT sensors:

• hydrostatic sensors;
• ultrasonic sensors;
• radar sensors;
• float sensors;
• capacitive sensors.

IoT sensors can be used for simple water tank monitoring, multiple water tanks with mesh network of sensors, frac tanks monitoring, as well as water capacity monitoring in a dam.

The use of various IoT indicators in the tank water level control system helps to monitor:

• Water Temperature;
• Water Pressure;
• Water pH level;
• Water salinity;
• Oxidation-reduction potential (ORP);
• Total dissolved solids (TDS);
• Conductivity;
• Water turbidity (water clarity).

There is a possibility to track not only water tanks but also pressure of water pump and use smart switch which operates in automatic mode – when the water level is low, the switch automatically turns on the pump, and when the water level in the tank is full, the switch turns off the water supply.

Besides IoT monitors smart water wireless monitoring system include next necessary components:

Power supply: In most cases IoT devices are energy efficient and do not require a lot of power. The are two popular types of power supply – batteries with high energy density and high voltage (lithium batteries) and energy harvesting technologies for extracting power from the surrounding environment such as solar energy, thermal energy, mechanical energy, environmental energy.

Connectivity: There are two popular types of wireless IoT device connection to IoT visualization software. The first one is Local area networks (LAN) using Wi-Fi for short-range communications . The second is wide area networks (WAN) using cellular (NB-IoT), satellite communication and radio network (LoRaWAN, Sigfox) for wide-range communications.

Integration with IoT Visualization software. Once IoT devices are connected and powered up, the last step is to integrate them with IoT visualisation software to get a picture of the water tank’s content.

ThingsBoard is IoT visualisation platform which provides a tank monitoring dashboards with real-time data visualisation, trend analysis, usage history. Ready to use Water Level Monitoring template allows easily monitor the status of the tank, set up measurement details and custom automatic alerts like low water levels, opening and closing pumps and valves to detect leaks or theft, also track water consumption.

Remote water level monitoring

A remote water level monitoring system collects data on the status of water tanks 24/7. The type of TLM varies depending on the industrial, commercial, or domestic use.

There are different types of domestic water tanks: overhead water tanks that install on the rooftop, open top-tanks installed on ground and underground water tanks. All this water tanks accomplish one main goal – supply house with necessary amount of water.
In domestic usage IoT device connectivity via Wi-Fi connection will be good choice for short-range communications within a specific location. TLM system provide convenient possibility to monitor water tank via Mobile App, tablet or Web Interface using PC.

In commercial usage water tanks are commonly used by water delivery companies to track the quality of the water delivered, as well as by health resorts to store sufficient amount of drinking water. In this case, IoT sensors that support wireless radio communication may be more appropriate, as companies often need to continuously monitor water condition even in rural areas where cellular coverage is limited.