Parameter-Less Remote Real-Time Control for the Adjustment of Pressure in Water Distribution Systems

Abstract

Reducing pressure in a water distribution system leads to a decrease in water leakage, decreased cracks in pipes and consumption decreases. Pressure management includes an advanced type called remote real-time control. Here pressure control valves are controlled in real-time in such a way to provide set optimal pressures mostly at remote consumer locations. A hydraulic valve is expected to minimize problems with transients, although the study also applies to other valves. The control is done by using a controller which typically depends on tunable parameters, which are laborious to determine. A parameter-less controller is simpler because there are no parameters to tune. Such an existing P-controller based on the flow in a pressure control valve being known, is enhanced from assuming constant flow to be valid for variable flow. This novel parameter-less controller performs significantly better than the former P-controller. Several recently proposed controllers, which were studied numerically, are compared: The two parameter-less controllers, and two parameter-dependent controllers. The new parameter-less controller performs either better or worse than the most optimally tuned parameter-dependent controllers.

Leakage Detection and Estimation Algorithm for Loss Reduction in Water Piping Networks

“…Thus, pressure control might be needed to minimise the leakage outflow through these nodes as well as the overall leakage in the network. The pipes connected to these nodes include pipes (4,5,59,60,70,71) for node 5, pipes (5,6,14,46,60,61,71) for node 6, and pies (51,52,53) to node 41 respectively. Any pipe connected to these nodes with a relatively high leakage flow rate requires a pressure control at either one or both of its end nodes.…”

“…More recently, the battle of background leakage outflows has been a subject of discussion in the research community [34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42]. The current battle of background leakage assessment for water networks (BBLAWN) is an attempt to combine the methodologies for water distribution systems rehabilitation planning and sectorization [43][44][45][46][47][48][49] with pressure control management strategies [50][51][52][53][54][55][56][57][58][59][60][61][62] to achieve a reduced leakage ratio and lower the water distribution systems operational cost. Certainly, reducing the pipe pressure will significantly reduce the leakage outflows in the network.…”

Exploring Numerically the Benefits of Water Discharge Prediction for the Remote RTC of WDNs

“…By making use of suitable algorithms operating on the pressure head measurements, a programmable logic controller sets the new suitable device setting to maintain the minimum desired pressure at the remote node(s). In the scientific literature of WDNs, the first study on service pressure RTC was carried out by Campisano et al [9], followed by many others [10][11][12][13][14][15]. Whereas the proportional algorithms of Campisano et al [9,10,12] only used the pressure head measurement at the critical node, Creaco and Franchini [11] set up a more effective algorithm that also makes use of the water discharge measurement in the pipe fitted with the control device.…”

“…Like the algorithm used by Campisano et al [9,10,12], the algorithm of Creaco and Franchini [11] has a parameter that needs to be tuned to ensure the maximum regulation performance. Later, a parameter-less algorithm with only slightly worse performance than the algorithm of Creaco and Franchini [11] was proposed for the RTC of control valves [13] and variable speed pumps [14]. The algorithm of Page et al [13,14] has the novel aspect of making use of the water discharge prediction in the pipe fitted with the control device.…”

“…Later, a parameter-less algorithm with only slightly worse performance than the algorithm of Creaco and Franchini [11] was proposed for the RTC of control valves [13] and variable speed pumps [14]. The algorithm of Page et al [13,14] has the novel aspect of making use of the water discharge prediction in the pipe fitted with the control device. The prediction is carried out through water discharge measurements at small temporal steps (smaller than the RTC temporal step, which has order of magnitude of some minutes).…”