Performance Evaluation Of A Drinking Water Distribution System Using Hydraulic Simulation Software For The City Of Oilton, Oklahoma

Abstract

The scope of the study was to evaluate the performance of drinking water distribution system of the City of Oilton, Oklahoma using hydraulic simulation software and recommend changes based on the findings which would help the City of Oilton operate their system with more efficiency. This study was a part of a larger project, the goal of which was to develop a cost-effective Decision Support Tool to help the Rural Water Districts of Oklahoma in the long term planning of their water infrastructure. The project was funded by the Oklahoma Water Resources Research Institute. The hydraulic simulation software used for the study was WaterCAD V8i which is a licensed software distributed by the Bentley Systems. The methodology incorporated briefly, was to identify the potential consumers around the demand nodes in the distribution network and assign these nodes base demands depending upon the number of consumers around that node. The behavior of the system was observed under base flow, peak flow, fire flow and diurnal flow conditions and its performance was evaluated based on mainly two things: hydraulic conditions and water quality.