City Water Resource Allocation Considering Energy Consumption in Jinan, China

Abstract

The conflict between urban energy supply and demand is becoming increasingly evident. One aspect that consumes a great deal of this energy is the allocation of urban water resources. This study proposes a new scheme for rationally allocating urban water resources considering the high levels of energy currently consumed in Jinan city of Shandong, China. The focus is on simultaneously minimizing energy consumption and water shortage rates and granting priority to public water supplies in line with the predicted water supply levels for all available sources. Based on this assessment, further adjustments were made in terms of system configuration and the analysis of energy consumption. The results of the general water resource allocation model not only show that Jinan’s total water supply in 2030 will increase by 33.7% from 2019 but that energy consumption will also increase by 58.5%. If energy consumption is constrained and water supplies are restricted for high-energy-consumption activities, the results of the water resource allocation model considering energy consumption show that energy consumption will increase only by 44.2%. And the results also show that local groundwater is less energy intensive than imported surface water, which suggests that groundwater should be preferred (at least for energy reasons). Through modeling to reduce the total energy consumption in water resource allocation, this paper can provide a reference for energy saving for urban water supply systems.