A decision support system to proactively manage subsurface utilities

Critical infrastructure assets are defined in terms of their purpose (e.g. roads, water, and energy) yet the ground, which supports these assets, can also be considered a critical asset leading to the conclusion that any assessment of critical infrastructure must consider the ground in that assessment. While the interdependency of critical infrastructures is recognised, the consequences of failing to recognise the ground as an asset can lead to failure of the infrastructure it supports. This motivates the need for a decision support system for subsurface utilities that takes into account the surrounding ground and the overlying road structure. These facilities mostly exist in an urban environment. The ground supports the road and the underlying utility which means the failure of any of these assets (road, ground, or utility) can trigger a failure in the others, the most extreme example being the collapse of roads due to erosion of the supporting ground by a leaking pipe. This paper describes the principles that underpin a novel decision support system for those engaged in street works of any kind, and how a multidisciplinary approach is being used to create a practical toolkit to reduce risk and minimise disruption to proactively manage subsurface utilities using site observations and investigations, public and private databases, expert opinions captured in a number of ontologies and an inference engine to produce guidance that takes into account risk and sustainability criteria

Smart water distribution system based on IoT networks, a critical review

The purpose of this paper is to discuss different existing technologies related to sensing in smart cities. The continuous growth of urban areas is a reality that should be faced by innovating more solutions that are efficient. Smart cities are one of the remarkable solutions, it can be seen as different intelligent systems or platforms that work together to ensure better sustainability. Sensors are at the core of smart cities. They collect data from different environments or infrastructures in order to send them to the cloud using different communications platforms. These data can be used to better manage the infrastructures or provide smarter services. However, they are various issues and challenges related to the ubiquitous sensors that should be solved. In the last section of this paper, a case study of smart water distribution system is presented with an overview of the related issues and challenges such as reliability, cost, and scalability. Also, a table is provided in this section to compare the results and challenges of the last five studies on producing smart pipes with the most common challenges