Strategic Placement of In-line Turbines for Optimum Power Generation and Leakage Reduction in Water Supply Networks

• Published in: Water resources management Vol. 38; no. 10; pp. 3623 - 3638
• Main Authors: Jain, Priyanshu, Khare, Ruchi
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Dordrecht Springer Netherlands 01.08.2024; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Algorithms; Alternative energy sources; Atmospheric Sciences; Civil Engineering; Drinking water; Earth and Environmental Science; Earth Sciences; Efficiency; Electric power generation; Electricity; Emission standards; Energy consumption; Environment; Environmental impact; Geotechnical Engineering & Applied Earth Sciences; Hydraulics; Hydroelectric power; Hydrogeology; Hydrology/Water Resources; Leakage; Networks; Nodes; Optimization; Optimization models; power generation; Python; Renewable energy; Renewable resources; Simulation; Turbine engines; Turbines; water; Water demand; water power; Water supply; Water supply systems; Water utilities; Water supply network; Power generation; Optimization; Leakage reduction; Rao algorithm
• ISSN: 0920-4741; 1573-1650
• DOI: 10.1007/s11269-024-03831-x

Conduit hydropower systems improve the efficiency of water supply networks (WSNs) by utilizing excess network pressure for providing renewable energy while significantly reducing leakage. A major problem in using conduit hydropower is finding the optimum location for installing power generation devices like in-line turbines or pumps operating as turbines (PATs). This paper suggests an optimization model to find the optimum location for placing in-line turbines in WSNs using a non-parametric Rao algorithm for optimal daily power generation. The methodology is tested on a hypothetical 5-Node network and later applied to a benchmark 25-Node network. Installing turbines at optimum locations reduced network leakage by 76332.00 and 380473.87 L, representing approximately 2.57% & 2.94% of the total water demand of 5-Node and 25-Node networks, respectively, and generated 184.12 & 547.48 kWh/day of hydropower.