Detection and Localisation of Pipe Bursts in a District Metered Area Using an Online Hydraulic Model

This thesis presents a research work on the development of new methodology for near-real-time detection and localisation of pipe bursts in a Water Distribution System (WDS) at the District Meters Area (DMA) level. The methodology makes use of online hydraulic model coupled with a demand forecasting methodology and several statistical techniques to process the hydraulic meters data (i.e., flows and pressures) coming from the field at regular time intervals (i.e. every 15 minutes). Once the detection part of the methodology identifies a potential burst occurrence in a system it raises an alarm. This is followed by the application of the burst localisation methodology to approximately locate the event within the District Metered Area (DMA). The online hydraulic model is based on data assimilation methodology coupled with a short-term Water Demand Forecasting Model (WDFM) based on Multi-Linear Regression. Three data assimilation methods were tested in the thesis, namely the iterative Kalman Filter method, the Ensemble Kalman Filter method and the Particle Filter method. The iterative Kalman Filter (i-KF) method was eventually chosen for the online hydraulic model based on the best overall trade-off between water system state prediction accuracy and computational efficiency. The online hydraulic model created this way was coupled with the Statistical Process Control (SPC) technique and a newly developed burst detection metric based on the moving average residuals between the predicted and observed hydraulic states (flows/pressures). Two new SPC-based charts with associated generic set of control rules for analysing burst detection metric values over consecutive time steps were introduced to raise burst alarms in a reliable and timely fashion. The SPC rules and relevant thresholds were determined offline by performing appropriate statistical analysis of residuals. The above was followed by the development of the new methodology for online burst localisation. The methodology integrates the information on burst detection metric values obtained during the detection stage with the new sensitivity matrix developed offline and hydraulic model runs used to simulate potential bursts to identify the most likely burst location in the pipe network. A new data algorithm for estimating the ‘normal’ DMA demand and burst flow during the burst period is developed and used for localisation. A new data algorithm for statistical analysis of flow and pressure data was also developed and used to determine the approximate burst area by producing a list of top ten suspected burst location nodes. The above novel methodologies for burst detection and localisation were applied to two real-life District Metred Areas in the United Kingdom (UK) with artificially generated flow and pressure observations and assumed bursts. The results obtained this way show that the developed methodology detects pipe bursts in a reliable and timely fashion, provides good estimate of a burst flow and accurately approximately locates the burst within a DMA. In addition, the results obtained show the potential of the methodology described here for online burst detection and localisation in assisting Water Companies (WCs) to conserve water, save energy and money. It can also enhance the UK WCs’ profile customer satisfaction, improve operational efficiency and improve the OFWAT’s Service Incentive Mechanism (SIM) scores.This STREAM project is funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council and Industrial Collaborator, United Utilities