A Many-Objective Analysis Framework for Large Real-World Water Distribution System Design Problems

Abstract

This paper presents a many-objective analysis framework to handle large real-world water distribution system design problems (WDSDP), which is a typically difficult infrastructure engineering optimization problem type. Six objectives are formulated, focusing on economic, structural and functional aspects in the operation and management of the water distribution system (WDS), and solved by Borg, which is one state-of-the-art multi-objective evolutionary algorithm (MOEA) in water resources. The framework comprehensively analyzes and reveals the underlying trade-offs among many objectives, thereby facilitating the selection of the most appropriate design solutions for real-world WDSs. A real-world WDSDP with 1278 decision variables is used to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed framework, and results show that it can clearly reveal the complex trade-offs among these six different objectives, and it greatly enhances the understanding of the underlying characteristics of Pareto-front solutions. The insights have great practical implications for optimally designing large real-world WDS problems.