Underground Utility Locating Technologies for Condition Assessment and Renewal Engineering of Water Pipeline Infrastructure Systems
Publication: Journal of Pipeline Systems Engineering and Practice
Volume 7, Issue 4
Abstract
Underground asset locating practices use new and existing technologies to accurately identify, characterize, and map buried utilities through the integration of professional utility records, visual site inspection, geophysical techniques, survey, and utility exposure. The efficient use of locating practices allows effective condition assessment and renewal engineering applications, which, in turn, improves asset management practices for water utilities. Utility engineers, managers, and practitioners need to be familiar with all locating technologies (working principles, capabilities, and limitations) to have an effective selection of the appropriate technologies for every scenario. There are capabilities and limitations of all existing underground utility locating technologies that are used by water utilities. This paper provides the factors affecting the reliability of underground pipe locating surveys and presents an overview of the capabilities and limitations of the locating technologies to guide water pipeline infrastructure practitioners through literature. Application of underground utility locating technologies by water and wastewater utilities was investigated through case studies and phone interviews. Recommendations on ways to improve locating technology applications for water and wastewater utilities were made based on the literature and practice review.
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Acknowledgments
The development of WATERiD is funded by the Water Environment Research Foundation (WERF) under the contract INFR9SG09 and INFR10SG09 through the USEPA’s Aging Water Infrastructure Research Program, and stems from the USEPA’s Sustainable Water Infrastructure Initiative. The authors would like to thank the National Science Foundation (NSF) for the partial funding under the grant NSF-CMMI-0801018,and for the support of the Sustainable Water Infrastructure Management (SWIM) Center of Excellence in the Institute of Critical Technology and Applied Science (ICTAS) at Virginia Tech. Special thanks is given to the representatives of various drinking water and wastewater utilities that provided valuable feedback and comments. The authors also would like to thank Mr. Yeun J. Jung for the research work he has conducted that led the way for this study.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Pipeline Systems Engineering and Practice
Volume 7 • Issue 4 • November 2016
Copyright
© 2016 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Aug 28, 2014
Accepted: Sep 11, 2015
Published online: May 19, 2016
Discussion open until: Oct 19, 2016
Published in print: Nov 1, 2016
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