Brolga Micro Water Treatment Plant

Brolga Micro Water Treatment Plant

Remote communities need safe water with no technician on call. Outerspace built an in-built brain that monitors itself, resolves faults autonomously and lets operators run every unit from anywhere.

Summary

Industry
  • Agriculture & Environment
  • Safety & Industrial
Expertise
  • Industrial Design
  • Mechanical Engineering
  • Electronic engineering
  • Systems Engineering
  • Firmware Design
Awards
Good Design Award

Project Details

Project Details

Challenge

Remote locations, always-on reliability

Many remote communities lack access to safe water. Water Source turned to Outerspace to evolve an early-stage prototype into a manufacturable product capable of running unattended in the world's harshest, most isolated environments.

IoT architecture & autonomous control logic

Outerspace's design centred on an in-built brain that continuously monitors system health, resolving most faults autonomously and collecting 20+ data points per second through a secure, cloud-connected IoT architecture of pumps, sensors and multi-stage filtration.

Outcome

The Brolga produces 30,000 litres of safe drinking water per day, meeting Australian and WHO standards, with all units networkable across sites. Remote operators can monitor, receive alerts and reconfigure systems from anywhere, without the need for on-ground technicians.

Technical Insights:

Industrial design (Creativity)

Holistic system architecture and mechanical layout, developed from early prototype stage

Mechanical engineering (Capability)

Portable, truck and container-transportable housing, multi-unit networking

Electronic engineering (Capability)

Secure sensor and pump integration, cloud-connected control, 20+ data points per second

Firmware design (Clarity)

Autonomous fault resolution, embedded health monitoring, remote dashboard and alerting

Systems engineering & program management (Collaboration)

Cross-team coordination with Water Source's specialists, AS/WHO compliance

Project image
From the outset, Outerspace applied a holistic, end-to-end approach... Brolga’s development required deep collaboration across mechanical, electronic, and firmware engineering teams.
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Installer placed unit parts
Technician takes a water sample from the dedicated outlet
Concept render of the unit in dramatic lighting
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