Improving leakage management in urban water distribution networks through data analytics and hydraulic simulation

Worldwide, water utilities are finding it increasingly difficult to meet the growing water demand. The problem, already acute in view of the urbanization trends, is compounded by the age of the infrastructure: one third of water utilities have 20% or more of their pipelines nearing the end of their useful life. This paper outlines an innovative approach for improving leakage management processes through the adoption of data analytics techniques and hydraulic simulation. More in detail, the aim is to provide analytical leaks localization and correspondent severity estimation in order to reduce time and costs for interventions and rehabilitation while improving asset management. The technical solution has been developed as a set of web services able to interoperate with other technological systems usually adopted by urban water distribution utilities, such as Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition (SCADA) system, Customer Information System (CIS), Geographical Information System (GIS) and Hydraulic Simulation tools. This paper presents some results obtained by the application of the approach to a real case study and also proves how its effectiveness may be improved in a sectorized water distribution network. © 2013 WIT Press.