An Integrated Decision-Making Framework to Appraise Water Losses in Municipal Water Systems

Abstract

To mitigate the acute water shortage problems, water utilities are combating to find potential solutions. Water losses management in Water Supply Networks (WSNs) is amongst the prominent solutions. This work intends to develop a decision support framework to diagnose the criticality of WSNs according to an associated Water Loss Risk Index (WLRI) at pipe and zone levels. It utilized the Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process (FAHP) to evaluate the influential factors that contribute to water losses. The Fuzzy Synthetic Evaluation Technique (FSET) has been utilized to assess WLRI at pipe level and Ordered Weighted Averaging (OWA) operator has been used to aggregate the individual WLRI values for each zone. The framework is extended by incorporating Monte Carlo simulation model to generate the final ranking of zones. The outcomes of this simulation showed fair stability in terms of ranking the scrutinized zones. The integration of this framework in water losses management practices and planning policies of water utilities has a large potential in improving water supply services and the performance of WSNs.