Considerations on transients in a water supply distribution network

Abstract

Lipnița is a village situated in a hilly region, in Constanta County. The water supply system has its own groundwater water source, placed in the middle of the village at a low elevation. Water is conveyed, by a long transmission duct to a storage tank from which it flows by gravity to the consumers. The distribution network has two long mains that intersect in a manifold with isolation valves, situated in the middle of the village. This topology of the system shows high static head for the transmission duct and high elevation differences between the end consumers and those in the centre of the village.The paper presents an analysis, by numerical simulation, on the transients that occur in two different segments of the system.The simulation was performed either for the original old steel made network, aiming at identifying the vulnerable cross sections and extreme pressure values. The results showed that maximal pressure values are not dangerous, but cavitation occurs along the pipeline. The same simulation was carried out for the new PEHD pipelines. The change of material and the increase in diameter of the new pipes showed better results regarding pressure variation during transients. Cavitation is avoided.