Maximize your Water/Wastewater Hydraulic Model

Utilities invest a significant amount on developing, calibrating, and maintaining a model; however, many utilities either are not using their model or are using only a fraction of its capabilities. Locate the feature list of your hydraulic modeling software vendor, and tick off the features that you use. What percentage of the software tool are you making use of? 5%? 10%? Are you integrating with your SCADA system? Helping to build a hydrant flushing schedule? Optimizing your system based on genetic algorithms? Using the model to support your capital planning? Granted, some features may be useful to only a small fraction of utilities, but many hydraulic models are underutilized.

The most common applications for hydraulic models have been for master planning, evaluating proposed facilities, and pipe design scenarios, but there is so much more. Think about the main challenges and opportunities you see in your system. Pipe breaks? Tanks not turning over? Consistent taste and odor complaints? Fireflow requests are backlogged? Old cast iron piping needs to be replaced? Energy costs are high and are increasing? Can a hydraulic model assist in the above challenges? Absolutely...and much, much more.

So what are the emerging trends in water/wastewater modeling? We are seeing several progressive utilities integrate their models with their SCADA system for real-time modeling, developing diurnal curves per zone, pump energy optimization, and operational modeling. We are seeing 2d modeling to model the surface flooding of wastewater systems in urban areas and long-term flow simulations. There is also more complete integration with asset management and GIS to assist with CIP, criticality, and capacity studies. Each one of these is certainly worthy of a lot of exploration (and we look forward to a lot of passionate discussion of these within this forum!) When you identify a real, ‘right-now' need, explore your model's existing functionality to help find cost-effective solutions, and put in the time to maintain your model, you're realizing the full value of your important investment.