Queens Award for cutting-edge water quality monitoring probe

Proteus Instruments have recently been awarded with a prestigious Queens Award for Enterprise (Innovation) for a water monitoring system they developed in partnership with University of Birmingham 

The technology was developed through a Knowledge Transfer Partnership, a UK government scheme that encourages collaboration between business and academia. Proteus worked alongside researchers from Birmingham University’s School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences, Kieran Khamis, Chris Bradley and David Hannah to create a multiprobe with an array of applications within the water quality, environmental monitoring, leisure and fishing sectors. 

The probe offers a precise profile of the health of water systems, their capability of supporting aquatic species and their safety for leisure use. It provides accurate and reliable real-time measurements of dissolved oxygen, organic carbon and bacterial contamination. This versatile probe can also be set up to measure other parameters such as biological oxygen demand and the quantity of dissolved oxygen uptake when organic matter breaks down in the water which, until now, was only possible after a 5 day laboratory test. Measuring these parameters ensures that wastewater can be safely discharged without causing harm to aquatic species. Other measurement parameters available include water pressure, pH, temperature, salinity, turbidity and specific pollutants such as chloride, nitrate, tryptophan, crude and refined oil, ammonium, optical brighteners and a variety of pollutants ubiquitous to chemical processes.

The probe provide laboratory level accuracy in real time, onsite, continuous measurements and is expected to change how we measure water quality. This rugged device can handle the harshest of conditions and requires minimal maintenance. This probe is already a global phenomenon – it has been installed in the River Ganges, the Chicago River and the docks in Swansea – and a high demand is anticipated from water companies and regulators across the globe.

Rob Stevens, Managing Director of Proteus Instruments, stated, “ The team is extremely proud to be awarded the Queen’s Award for Enterprise: Innovation.  We are one of only 51 organisations in the UK to receive this award, which is the highest accolade for any UK business.”