Operational Perspective of the Impact of Failures in Water Distribution Systems

Failures in water distribution systems (WDS) occur on daily basis, requiring the fast esponse from WDS operators. This paper presents an impact model which investigates he adverse effects of failures from an operational rather than strategic perspective in rder to provide a better insight into their development over a given impact horizon. The erformance indicators (PI) currently in place have been found inadequate and a set of ew operational PI considering the magnitude, duration and sensitivity of customers has een introduced. The proposed operational impact model has been applied on a case tudy where a pressure-driven hydraulic model has been coupled with a geographic nformation system (GIS) and a discolouration model in order to provide a omprehensive overview of the failure to allow WDS operators to make more informed ecisions.