A METHODOLOGY FOR THE EVALUATION OF OPTIMAL PUMPING SYSTEM OPERATION THROUGH SYNTHETIC INDICES

The electric energy market liberalization recently occurred in many countries of the world has allowed the diffusion of electric rates that promote off-peak period energy usage in the night hours and penalize peak period energy usage in the diurnal hours. In this paper, a methodology for strategic planning and management of simple pumping stations in small Water Distribution Systems (WDS) for which “ad hoc” electric pumping cost estimations are not usually carried out, is proposed. In particular, an ‘a priori’ evaluation of the best operating planning to be adopted in order to minimize pumping during peak periods and maximize it during off peak periods while also satisfying the system constraints and users’ demands, is implemented by means of the identification of a few synthetic indices such as the capacity of the tank, the pumped water volume, the mean water demand, etc. The proposed methodology is based on the simulation of a large number of theoretical water distribution system configurations and tested in a number of Italian real-life water distribution systems. The preliminary results show the proposed indices as useful tools to be adopted for an ‘a priori’ evaluation of the best operating pumping strategy in terms of both energy and costs saving.