A Word on Water

Exciting changes in Water Management and Conservation.

  

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Irrigation Management Systems has been saving water for it's clients since the 80's.  During all of those years and up to today, the primary central control irrigation system used by IMS is Maxicom. 

Maxicom has been around longer than any other central system on the market and it still has the most robust feature set even after all of these years.  Now that is not to suggest that Maxicom is superior in every way to other competing products.  In fact, IMS runs a handful of irrigation systems which do not use Maxicom.

These sites were picked up by IMS well after they had been developed and already had non-Maxicom hardware in place.  Even though these systems are not as feature rich, IMS still saves water in a big way.  That's because saving irrigation water requires the right kind of hardware/software AND professional management.  IMS has brought the professional management for over 20 years.  We just need the right hardware installed on site.

One big drawback for these central control irrigation systems is the cost.  If the hardware is installed when a property is developed, then the cost is not an impediment since it is a small expense in the context of the whole development. 

However, if the property is already done then retrofitting the irrigation system with a central control system hardware is much less appealing because of the cost.  We're talking four figures just to replace a single, standard irrigation controller.  For most property owners and property managers, that is difficult to justify. 

A New Era?

Let me ask you a few questions.  How much did you pay for your most recent television?  How much more advanced technologically is that television compared to the one it replaced?  Finally, how much did that first television cost compared to the second?

Chances are that your answers went something like this:

TV #2 > technology than TV #1 and

TV #2 about the same price or lower price than TV #1

In fact, a similar answer set would be the case for many products that have been around over the last 20-30 years: cell phones, microwave ovens, personal computers, etc.

Central control irrigation products have long been immune to this price/technology dynamic.  That is changing.

IMS has started some parnterships and initiatives that hold some promise of providing reliable, effective central control irrigation hardware at much lower equipment costs.  This could be a game changer folks.

Instead of investing a few thousand dollars to retrofit a single controller, it will now take a few hundred dollars instead.  This is a cost reduction of at least 70 percent and makes the benefits of professionally managed central control irrigation much more available to existing properties.

IMS is very satisfied with the capabilities of systems like Maxicom.  Running them properly and diligently, IMS saves substantial amounts of water and money for its clients and will continue to do so for a long time.

Now IMS has equipment options to offer that are much more affordable and have the feature sets which IMS can use to save water in a manner like we do now with long existing products like Maxicom.  This is really exciting stuff.