在过去的几年里，人们对能源和水之间复杂的相互作用产生了浓厚的兴趣，这种相互作用被称为水-能源关系。¹能源和水的自由和不受限制的可用性和获取可以促进经济的增长并提高生活质量。水-能源关系被认为是未来几年全球增长的水市场必须面对的最重要的多学科挑战之一。目前，许多水系统没有从长期可持续性的角度进行管理。水务公司(WU)面临着进一步的挑战，如其基础设施老化和低成本回收，导致缺乏资金用于运营和维护(O&M)。从水的提取、处理到运输，水的生产和分配的所有阶段都需要能源。无论地理位置、规模和水网效率如何，能源成本都是WU最关心的问题。³另一方面，在发展中国家，WU很难改善其服务或将其网络扩展到没有服务的社区。考虑到所有这些事实，并考虑到经济和竞争情景，迫使应对来自各个领域(市场，技术，社会……)的压力，导致需要实施能够满足这些日益增长的需求的新方法和流程，并试图实时管理响应和行动。智能软件解决方案可以应用于网络，无论它们是具有智能计量和大量数据还是较少记录数据。它们增强了操作员的能力; knowledge of this data, turn it into useful information for decision-making related to the operation, maintenance and the design of the water supply network. In this paper, an application of an intelligent software solution is presented. WatEner, a smart Information and Communication Technology (ICT) solution that combines the key factors of energy consumption with further operational requirements of drinking water supply to improve the management of water supply networks, has been tested with good results by the WU of the city of Karlsruhe, a water rich area in North-West - Europe where the main objective was to save energy in the drinking water distribution. As a conclusion, a non-structural solution for the water-energy nexus can have a great impact on several matters (e.g. climate change, carbon footprint, WUs balance sheets, water losses) with reasonable investment in only a few sensors in the water supply network.