Water Distribution Network Reliability: Connectivity Analysis

Abstract

This paper presents a methodology to analyze the reliability of a regional water distribution network. The proposed reliability analysis method focuses on the impact of link failures on source-demand connectivity, which is used as a measure of the mechanical reliability of the network. The mechanical reliability index is computed using the minimum cut-set method. The identification of minimum cut-sets consists of four stages: (1) For source-demand pairs; (2) for individual demand nodes; (3) for a group of demand nodes; and (4) for all demand nodes in the system. By using the multiple-stage approach, the total number of simulations required in the analysis is greatly reduced. Computational efficiency of the minimum cut-set method is further enhanced by using a highly efficient embedded generalized network algorithm to solve the optimization model used in the simulations. The results from the reliability analysis can be used to locate crucial pipelines in the network whose failure will severely impair the source-demand connectivity. The developed methodology is applied to a large-scale regional water distribution network associated with the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California.