PRPsym: A Modeling System for Simulation of Stochastic Water Demands

PRPsym is a computer program that provides a platform for simulating stochastic water uses and then aggregating stochastic and deterministic water demands at network nodes. In PRPsym, residential water demands are further categorized into indoor and outdoor stochastic water use to more accurately represent water consumption behavior. A non-homogeneous Poisson Rectangular Pulse (PRP) process is used to characterize the stochastic intensity, duration and frequency of water demands for indoor or outdoor water uses. Validation tests show numerical simulations with PRPsym are reasonably consistent with theoretical values for many benchmark criteria of the analytical PRP model. PRPsym provides flexible options to control the generation of stochastic water demands and output of results. It can be used to generate a water demand series with any time scale from one second to one day for network nodes or fixtures in a household. It can also be setup to produce files that can be directly used to run EPANET. PRPsym is built with an object-oriented method to provide robust and fast simulation of water demands. As such, PRPsym is a powerful tool for planning and managing water distribution networks.