Critical infrastructureEnvironment and cleanliness
CAM-150
Foam spilling over the clarifier
A circular clarifier at a treatment plant, seen from above. The surface is covered in white foam, and the foam is going over the perimeter wall and falling onto the concrete, which is already wet all the way round. An operator has stopped on the road on the left and is looking at the tank. Behind, the other basins and the second clarifier, still clean.
Turn on IRIS Vision
AI-generated image
What IRIS understands
What it recognizes in this scene
- foam over the wall
- foam on the concrete
- clarifier basin
- operator on the road
- the next clarifier
What this camera measures
An alert says something’s happening. The reading says how much.
- 18 minGoing over for
- 1 / 4Tanks with foam at the rim
- 2Drains reached
- 2People in the frame
- 1 h 32 minSince anyone last came past
- 09:12Time of the alert
The figures on this screen are an example from the illustration, not any client’s measurement.
The rule
You decide once. IRIS applies it always.
If
foam from a clarifier goes over the top of the wall and is still going over some minutes later
Then
- alert the operator on duty with the camera, the tank and the video of the moment
- log what time it started going over, so you know how long it has been running
- keep the alert open until someone confirms it has gone back down
The instruction that set it up«Tell me when foam starts going over the edge of a clarifier and keeps going over, even at four in the morning when nobody is on site.»
What changes
What changes for whoever answers for the site
A clarifier throwing foam is visible to the naked eye: anyone walking past would catch it. The trouble is that almost nobody walks past. At night there’s one operator on duty for the whole plant, and if the foam starts at three it gets found on the seven o’clock round. That’s four hours of foam falling onto the concrete and four hours of a process drifting. IRIS doesn’t fix the clarifier and doesn’t know why it’s foaming: it sees foam going over the edge and raises it while it’s happening, with the camera and the video. What changes isn’t the problem, it’s the hour somebody finds out.
What people usually ask
Does IRIS know why the clarifier is foaming?
No, and it won’t pretend to. IRIS sees foam going over the edge and water where the concrete should be dry. It doesn’t measure flow, it doesn’t analyze the water and it doesn’t know what liquid it is. The cause is for the plant manager to find with lab results and process history; what the camera adds is the exact time it started and the video of what was happening then.
Does this replace the plant’s own instruments?
No, and it doesn’t compete with them. Instruments measure inside the water and they’re the ones that give you the number. The camera looks at what’s visible from outside: whether something is coming out where it shouldn’t. They are two different things and they get along well, because a probe can sit inside its range while the wall is pouring foam, and the other way round too. And the camera is already there, watching places where there’s no instrument at all.
Does IRIS identify the operator in the picture?
No. IRIS does not identify anyone: it does not recognize faces, it does not read license plates, it does not compare them against any database and it does not store who anyone is. It sees that there’s a person in the frame, because knowing whether somebody is nearby changes the decision, and that’s all. Who that person is, it does not know and does not need to.
A different case every time
No extra alarms here. Just what needs looking at.
Not a recorded video, not an explanatory drawing: a summary of the real screen, with a different case every time it starts. There’s a lot more behind it.
- Cameras on the map
- You draw an area
- What passed shows up
Next step
Who is watching when the load swings over somebody?
11 cases: 9 raise an alert when something happens and 2 only measure. You see each image as it is, and then with what IRIS understands on top.
Who is watching the yard screen when the fight starts?
17 cases: 16 raise an alert when something happens and one only measures. You see each image as it is, and then with what IRIS understands on top.
And the best part
Sometimes you don’t need an alarm:you need a number.
How many people came in, and when. You draw a line over the image and the camera counts. People counting is approved by the Centro Español de Metrología — Spain’s national metrology institute — through NeuralPax. It’s a Spanish approval: it isn’t equivalent to any U.S. certification and we don’t present it as one. What crosses over is the method. The same line, in the same place, every day.
Tell us your problem and we’ll say whether IRIS understands it, or not yet.
A person answers, the same working day.