inside this issue: cws hosted conference a resounding success! · 2017-07-10 · 3) integrated...
TRANSCRIPT
Visit us at: www.exeter.ac.uk/cws
CWS Newsletter
CWS hosted conference a resounding success!
Centre for Water Systems hits the headlines with innovative research
Over 230 delegates from around the world met at the University of Exeter for the eleventh conference on Computing and Control for the Water Industry (CCWI). Or-ganised by the Centre for Water Systems this conference brought together leading experts from academic institutions and industry to discuss, present, disseminate and share ideas for the water business. They addressed issues such as cutting edge technology in information and communication systems for efficient Urban Wa-ter Management, Sustainability, Real-time Monitoring, Modelling, and Water Quality Management. Many exciting new research findings were presented during the three-day event. Professor Dragan Savic said: “The papers presented during the conference not only indicated the direction of future developments, but also offered some very innovative and practical solutions”.
The biennial series of conferences are organised alternately by the universities of Brunel, De Montfort, Exeter, Sheffield and Imperial College.
Contact [email protected] for more information or for copies of the proceedings.
Engineers in the Centre for Water Systems have pioneered new methods for detect-ing pipe leaks and identifying flood risks with technologies normally used for com-puter game graphics and Artificial Intelligence. These techniques could help to iden-tify water supply and flooding problems more quickly than ever before, potentially saving people from the traumatic experience of flooding or not having water on tap.
The new techniques were presented by a team from the Centre for Water Systems at the CCWI 2011conference. Two papers caught not only the imagination of dele-gates present at the conference but also of the world’s news media. Amongst oth-ers, they were reported in:
Computer game technology helps to spot leaking pipes – The Engineer
Researchers use computer game technology to detect leaking pipes – TopNews New Zealand Contact: Dragan Savic, [email protected] or Zoran Kapelan [email protected] for more information.
Inside this issue:
Current Research 2
Projects Completed 3
Overseas Partnerships 4/5
Visitors 5
News of CWS Mem-bers
6
MSc in Urban Water Systems / Publications
7
Events / Current pro-jects
8
Special points of inter-est:
New tools for Water Resource planning
CWS strengthens part-nerships with Universi-ties in China and USA
Volume IV, Issue 2
Autumn 2011
CWS Newsletter
Visit us at: www.exeter.ac.uk/cws
Current Research
Five new EngD projects have begun:
A project with HR Wallingford to develop new decision making methods for flexible adaptation of water engineering systems to a changing climate, urbanisation and other future uncertainties. It will first develop a generic software system to implement a number of well known methods for decision making under uncer-tainty. Then, specific water system models will be developed to support adaptation decisions relating to ur-ban drainage, fluvial and coastal flood related problems. These models will then be tested on a number of pilot sites and the results obtained will be used to determine the most suitable decision making methods.
Work with United Utilities (UU) to develop new methods for the effective and efficient real-time manage-ment of water distribution systems. The UU water company is currently upgrading its SCADA system by installing a large number of new data loggers in their water distribution systems. This will enable the recep-tion of near real-time pressure and flow data from field sensors to the control room. Once developed, the new technology will be used in the UU control room to more effectively and efficiently manage their water distribution systems resulting in significant monetary savings and improved company PR.
Together with Northumbrian Water work will look into: 1) Application of multi-objective optimisation to de-velop optimal intervention, control and management strategies for wastewater systems; 2) Impact analysis of system and future uncertainties (such as climate change and urbanisation) on management strategies; 3) Integrated assessment of various options for the water companies with the aim of reducing energy use and GHG emissions; and 4) Integrated assessment of the impacts of SUDS on flood risk and water pollu-tion risk by considering in detail the wider water cycle through a fully integrated urban wastewater model.
A project with Hydro International will establish protocols for the selection of flow attenuation mechanisms to prevent flooding, minimise treatment and maintenance requirements, and reduce detrimental effects on the environment as a result of pollutant transport and accumulation. This will lead to the development of decision support tools which can be used by drainage authorities, consultants, developers and other stake-holders for the selection of attenuation mechanisms that will provide more effective and resilient urban drainage systems.
Work with AECOM will: (1) investigate processes and tools to maximise the potential benefits of using rela-tional databases to enhance data collection and availability for strategic asset management; (2) develop customisable performance and risk based analysis platforms, driven by corporate data systems, which form the basis of asset management plans; (3) develop and implement tools to permit engineers to evaluate mul-tiple intervention scenarios in terms of a variety of different criteria; (4) integrate optimisation tools into the decision making process to identify intervention strategies which are justifiable, auditable and quantifiable in their ability to deliver economically efficient and risk adverse solutions; (5) analyse and use data mining tools to extract and process useful information from real-time asset performance systems; (6) implement GIS and scenario modelling tools to better understand the consequence of asset failure.
Contact: [email protected] for information about any of these projects.
Page 2 CWS Newsletter
New Research project with United Utilities A three year Knowledge Transfer Partnership project between the Centre for Water Systems and United Utili-ties PLC has begun. The work will develop further and customise the recently patented prototype Burst / Leak Detection System .
This system detects bursts, leaks and other anomalies in a water distribution system by analysing pressure and flow data in real-time. Unitied Utilities PLC is currently the largest listed UK Water business, supplying approxi-mately 2,000 ML of water to over 7 million customers every day via a network of more than 40,000 kilometres of water mains. For more information, contact: Zoran Kapelan ([email protected]).
Visit us at: www.exeter.ac.uk/cws
Page 3 Autumn 2011
Tools for Water Resource Planning
EngD students are challenged
A group from CWS have developed a suite of new methods for the optimal design and rehabilitation of water dis-tribution systems under future uncertainty. These include: 1) a new optimisation methodology that makes use of Sobol's sensitivity analysis to screen out insensitive decision variables and guide the formulation of a reduced complexity WDS design optimisation problem, which is then solved using the ε-NSGAII optimisation method; (2) a new fuzzy probabilistic methodology for optimal WDS design and rehabilitation which combines aleatoric and epistemic uncertainties in a unified framework enabling to effectively handle various uncertainty sources arising from the WDS design process, including severe future uncertainties; (3) a new methodology to characterise and quantify the risk of hydraulic and mechanical failures under demand and other uncertainties. This is the success-ful conclusion of a project funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC). For more details, please contact Zoran Kapelan ([email protected]).
Ski lifts and fibreglass steps for providing continued access down an eroding cliff on Dorset's Jurassic Coast, were among suggestions which EngD students came up with during their challenge week in July. Other solutions included modular steps that could be reassembled quickly. St Gabriel's Steps at Charmouth have to be relocated every two years because of the constant erosion in this protected area, which is popular with visitors. The research engineers worked in four teams to develop their access proposals and finally pre-sented them to National Trust officers. Rob Rhodes, of the National Trust's West Dorset office, said: "There were suggestions on how to improve the safety aspect of the steps by giving them a lower gradient, as well as plans to strengthen the steps by making them modular, so that they could come apart easily whenever a landslide occurs and then be reassembled quickly.
It was great to hear the students' thought processes. They had some ingenious ideas and really understood the brief, and it was fantastic to get a fresh set of eyes and minds to solve what is an ongoing problem."
The students are studying for an EngD degree through the ‘STREAM’ programme, an Industrial Doctoral Centre (IDC) for the Water Sector, funded through the EPSRC. Contact: [email protected] for more information about this scheme.
St Gabriel's Steps at Charmouth have to be relo-cated every two years—EngD students consider
the problem
St Gabriel's Steps at Charmouth have to be relo-cated every two years—EngD students consider
the problem
New methods developed for the design of water distribution systems under uncertainty—Project completed
Professor Zoran Kapelan is currently working as a consultant on the project: “UKWIR WR27: Water Resource Planning Tools”. This project is reviewing existing water resource planning practices in the UK and abroad. It will then identify and recommend possible improvements to these practices in the UK. The project team comprises Halcrow Goup Ltd (lead contractor), ICS Consulting, Imperial College and the University of Exeter and is sup-ported by the Environment Agency and OFWAT. The University of Exeter’s contribution to the project is centred around the development of a new decision framework for integrated stochastic modelling and planning of water resources under future climate change and other uncertainties. For additional information please contact Zoran Kapelan ([email protected]).
Visit us at: www.exeter.ac.uk/cws
Overseas Partnerships Over the summer Dr Guangtao Fu visited a number of Chinese universities including Tsinghua, Fudan, East China Normal Uni-versity, Tongji, Zhejiang Univer-sity and Dalian University of Tech-nology.
He held discussions with colleagues about shared research interests at each university. They developed ideas about possible collaboration, such as PhD student co-supervision and joint applications for funding.
As well as making new contacts, the visit has strengthened Exeter’s existing stra-tegic partnerships with Tsinghua, Fudan, and East China Normal University through identifying a broader range of future collaboration. He was funded in this visit through an Outward Mobility Academic Fellowship from the International Of-fice at the University of Exeter.
While he was in China, Dr Guangtao Fu also attended the IWA Cities of the Future conference in Xi’an, China.
Professor Tiit Koppel from Tallinn University of Technology, Estonia, invited Professor Zoran Kapelan to deliver four two-hour lectures for the PhD course at Tallinn entitled "Optimal Solutions in Water Systems". The course was attended by both researchers and practitioners from Estonia and Finland. He gave lectures on advanced techniques for opti-mal water distribution system design and rehabilitation, optimal real-time pump scheduling and optimal leakage detection and pressure management. Based on the feedback pro-vided, the course was extremely well received.
Janez Susnik recently attended the 8th IWA Symposium on System Analysis and Integrated Assess-ment (WaterMatex) which ran from 20-22 June, 2011, in San Sebas-tian, Spain. He presented a paper using work carried out for the WASSERMed project t i t led 'System Dynamics Modelling ap-plied for the integrated simulation of complex water systems'.
Sušnik J., Vamvakeridou-Lyroudia L. S., Savić D. A. and Kapelan Z., 2011, System Dynamics Modelling applied for the integrated simulation of complex water systems, Proceedings of the 8th IWA Symposium on Systems Analysis and Integrated Assessment, San Sebastian, Spain, 20-22 June 2011, pp. 535-542.)
Page 4 CWS Newsletter
The imposing towers at Fudan University, which Guangtao Fu
visited.
Dr Diego Gomez has just returned from a week-long trip to Chile, where he was invited as a keynote speaker at the summit “Water Challenges in Chile” (http://www.cumbreagua.cl/), in October. The event was organized by Foundation Chile, foundation Chile Todos, University Adolfo Ibáñez, and the Chilean Government, Ministry of Agriculture. The summit focused on the current and future challenges for water resources in Chile, which faces problems from overexploitation, distribution and heterogeneous availability in a rapidly developing country. Dr. Gomez represented the University of Exeter and spoke on “Emerging Challenges to Groundwater” which high-lighted the impacts of pollution, overpopulation and climate change on resources.
Visit us at: www.exeter.ac.uk/cws
Page 5 Autumn 2011
International Water Week
Professor Dragan Savic attended a four-day Workshop entitled: 'Water Challenges of Urbanisation' for Young Scientists during International Water Week in Amsterdam (1-4 November 2011).
The workshop brought together international PhD students and young professionals from the water industry. Each person had prepared a scientific paper on the topic of ‘Water challenges of urbanisation’ for discussion in the workshop. Their papers addressed global problems associated with the rapid growth of cities all round the world. The workshop was led by three professors of water management, of which Dragan was the only one from the UK, and several senior water professionals. The outcome of the workshop was a vision of opportunities which could be used to solve urbanisation problems. This vision was presented on the final day of the conference and will be published in a journal.
Waternet, IWA and Amsterdam RAI organised the programme for the Young Water Professionals at the conference, in collaboration with UNESCO-IHE, the Netherlands Water Partnership and the Royal Dutch Water Network.
2011 International Summer School at Exeter
Visitors from the University of South Florida
Continuing the report on our partnership with the University of South Florida, CWS hosted a workshop entitled: “2011 UNEXE-USF Green Water Infrastructure” in Exeter in September. Professor James Mihelcic, Dr Qiong Zhang and Dr Maya Trotz, from South Florida joined CWS members to explore options for the two Univer-sities to cooperate in research into the broader topic of Green Infra-structure in the water field and showcased a series of presentations and discussions by academic staff from both institutions. The Uni-versity of South Florida is ranked 16th as an ‘Up-and-Comer' among the country's national universities in the 2011 edition of U.S. News & World Report's Best Colleges and is on the list of ‘best col-leges’ as ranked by the Princeton Review. Cooperation is expected
to continue with visiting graduate students and an upcoming 2012 workshop to be hosted in Florida. The work-shop was funded by a British Council CONNECT grant held by Professor David Butler.
The University of Exeter held the second International Summer School during the summer (16 July – 6 August). The International Summer School offered domestic and international graduate students the opportu-nity to study academically challenging, credit rated courses in the UK. The programme gave a choice of five pathways from such diverse areas as Law, Business, Humanities and the Sciences. The Centre for Water Systems was represented in the programme by Professors Dragan Savic, Zoran Kapelan, David Butler, and Dr. Diego Gomez, who focused on water issues related to the pathway Climate Change: Technology and Society, offered by the College of Engineering, Mathematics and Physical Sciences, alongside guest speakers from the Met Of-fice. The results were very positive with a 91% student satisfaction rate overall. The University is currently prepar-ing for next summer’s School: (http://www.exeter.ac.uk/international/summerschool/ ).
Visit us at: www.exeter.ac.uk/cws
News of Past and Present CWS Members Congratulations to Professor David Butler for being elected chair of the Joint Commit-tee on Urban Drainage (JCUD) for the next three years. This international committee has two parent bodies – the International Water Association and the International Asso-ciation for Hydro-Environment Engineering and strives to maintain its long-standing broad international recognition as a prominent contributor to the advancement of the sci-entific knowledge in the field of urban drainage. It considers its activities in the wider con-text of urban water systems, with the ambition of developing and promoting a sustainable and integrated urban water management (http://www.jcud.org/).
David is seen here (left) taking over from the previous chair, Professor Peter Steen Mik-kelson from the Danish Technical University, during the 12th International Conference on Urban Drainage held in Porto Alegre, Brazil.
Congratulations also to Dr Albert Chen and Professor Slobodan Djord-jevic who have been awarded the ERES (European Real Estate Society)/JPR (Journal of Property Research) Award 2011 for Best Paper in Real Estate Economics. They share a prize of €1,000 with Dr Yu Chen (leading co-author) and Professor Gwilym Pryce from the University of Glasgow and Professor Bernard Fingleton from University of Cambridge. The paper "Implications of rising flood risk for residential real estate prices and the loca-tion of employment" was presented at the 18th ERES Conference held in Eindhoven in June 2011 and will be published in the Routledge Journal of Property Research.
More congratulations go to Professor Dragan Savic, who has been appointed as a member of the Strategic Council of the International Water Association . The Strategic Council provides guidance to the Board of Di-rectors and the Governing Assembly in the strategic direction of the Association, and assists in the development and coordination of member activities within the Association.
We also congratulate Dr Janez Susnik, who was placed second in the IAHR UK Section Young Persons' Paper Competition for his paper: 'System Dynamics Modelling applied for the assessment of water resources in a com-plex water system'.
Welcome! We welcome 5 new EngD Students: Isaac Okeya, working on a project with United Utilities, supervised by Professor Zoran Kapelan; Thomas Roach, working on a project with HR Wallingford, supervised by Professor Zoran Kapelan; Arturo Casal-Campos, working on a project with Northumbrian Water, supervised by Professor David Butler; Ben Ward, working on a project with AECOM, supervised by Professor Dragan Savic; Chris Newton, working on a project with Hydro International, supervised by Dr Fayyaz Memon. and 3 new PhD students: Christine Sweetapple, supervised by Dr Guangtao Fu and Professor David Butler; Jeanne-Rose Renee, supervised by Professor Slobodan Djordjevic and Professor David Butler; Roland Kromanis, supervised by Dr Prakash Kripakaran and Professor Dragan Savic.
Goodbye! Dr Josef Bicik has left Exeter; Josef was largely responsible for the success of the NEPTUNE project in which he contributed to the development of the real-time decision-support system for anomaly management in water distri-bution systems. After obtaining his PhD in the Centre for Water Systems in 2010 he continued to work as a KTP Associate working with Yorkshire Water to implement some of the NEPTUNE system elements. He has taken up a post in Germany with the firm ABB. We are glad to say that he still keeps his involvement with CWS activities as an Honorary Research Fellow.
Page 6 CWS Newsletter
Maximum flood depth
1
Visit us at: www.exeter.ac.uk/cws
Page 7 Autumn 2011
MSc in Urban Water Systems
Journal Papers
Recent Publications
The MSc in Urban Water Systems is offered by the Centre for Water Systems at the University of Exeter and is the only course of its type in the UK. It draws on the experience and cutting-edge research capability of the Centre staff together with external lecturers from leading companies and government agencies, ensuring de-livery of a theoretically sound, yet practically relevant course.
This programme trains students in the essentials of urban water supply and urban drainage technology together with the hydroinformatic tools for simulating their per-formance, all in a context that encourages a wide, integrated systems approach to their implementation.
For full programme details and information about how to apply visit: www.exeter.ac.uk/cws/msc
Topical issues covered on the course include: Water losses and leakage, Water efficiency, Climate change, Sustainability, Asset management, Whole-life costing, Urban flooding, Integrated modelling, Risk and uncertainty.
Full or part time attendance is possible. The individual Research Project can be un-dertaken at a place of work with a University supervisor. A Postgraduate Diploma and Certificate can be studied over a shorter period.
For further information please contact Zoran Kapelan [email protected].
New Books
Wu, Z.Y., Farley, M., Turtle, D., Kapelan, Z., Boxall, J.. Mounce, S., Dahasahasra, S., Mulay, M. and Kleiner, Y., (2011), “Water Loss Reduction”, Bentley Institute Press, Exton, Pennsylvania, ISBN: 978-1-934493-08-3.
Saul A. J., Djordjević S., Maksimović Č. And Blanksby J. (2011). Integrated urban flood modelling, In: Flood Risk Science and Management, ed. by G. Pender and H. Faulkner, Wiley-Blackwell, 258-288.
Leandro J., Djordjević S., Chen A., Savić D. A. and Stanić, M. (2011), Calibration of a 1D/1D urban flood model using 1D/2D model results in the absence of field data, Water Science & Technology, 64(5), 1016-1024.
Djordjević S., Butler D., Gourbesville P., Mark O. and Pasche E. (2011), New policies to deal with climate change and other drivers impacting on resilience to flooding in urban areas: the CORFU approach, Environmental Sci-ence & Policy, 14(7), 864-873.
Bicik, J., Kapelan, Z., Makropoulos, C. and D.A. Savić (2011) Pipe burst diagnostics using evidence theory, Journal of Hydroinformatics, Vol 13, No 4, pp. 596-608.
Boyko C.T., M. R. Gaterell, A. R. G. Barber, J. Brown, J. R. Bryson, D. Butler, S.Caputo, M. Caserio, R. Coles, R. Cooper, G. Davies, R. Farmani, J. Hale, A. C. Hales, C., N. Hewitt, D. V. L. Hunt, L. Jankovic, I. Jefferson, J. M. Leach, D. R. Lombardi, A. R. Mackenzie, F. A. Memon, T. A. M. Pugh, J. P. Sadler, C. Weingaertner, J. D. Whyatt, & C. D. F. Rogers (2011). Benchmarking sustainability in cities: the role of indicators and future scenar-ios, Global Environmental Change, doi:10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2011.10.004.
MSc in Urban Water Systems:
now accredited as a Technical course by
JBM providing ‘further learning’ for those in-
tending to become Chartered Engineers
Contact [email protected] for copies of the proceedings
of the CCWI 2011 conference
Visit us at: www.exeter.ac.uk/cws
Current CWS projects HR Wallingford Knowledge Transfer Partnership (EPSRC/TSB) Contact: [email protected]
Urban Futures SUE II Consortium (EPSRC) Contact: [email protected]
ReVISIONs SUE II Consortium (EPSRC) Contact: [email protected]
STREAM Industrial Doctorate Centre (EPSRC) Contact: [email protected]
Flood Risk Management Research Consortium (EPSRC) Contact: [email protected]
CADDIES Simplified Dual-Drainage Modelling (EPSRC) Contact: [email protected]
SWERVE – Severe Weather Events Risk and Vulnerability Estimator (EPSRC) Contact: [email protected]
CORFU – Collaborative research on flood resilience in urban areas (FP7) Contact: [email protected]
2 Yorkshire Water Knowledge Transfer Partnerships (EPSRC/TSB) Contact: [email protected] & [email protected]
PREPARED Enabling Change (FP7) Contact: [email protected]
WASSERMed – Water Availability and Security in Southern Europe and the Mediterranean (FP7) Contact: [email protected]
TRUST – Transitions to the Urban water Services of Tomorrow (FP7)Contact: [email protected]
@qua ICT for Water Efficiency Contact: [email protected]
Bridging the Gaps: Exeter Science Exchange — Contact: [email protected]
Land of the MUSCOs (EPSRC) Contact: [email protected]
Knowledge Transfer Partnership with United Utilities (EPSRC/TSB) Contact: [email protected]
Forthcoming events
Lecture: 8 December 2011, University of Exeter, Harrison Building, Room 004, at 4:10 pm Dr Ole Mark, DHI, Visiting Professor at the University of Exeter ‘Impact of Climate Change on Urban Flooding: a fairy tale in-spired by Hans Christian Andersen’ Conferences: 18-19 April 2012, University of Exeter 13th IWA UK National Young Water Professionals Confer-ence See: http://events.exeter.ac.uk/YWP2012 14-18 July 2012, Hamburg University of Technology 10th International Conference on Hydroinformatics (HIC 2012) See: www.hic2012.org 4-7 September 2012, Belgrade, Serbia 9th International Conference on Urban Drainage Modelling See: http://hikom.grf.bg.ac.rs/9UDM 5-7 September 2013, University of Exeter International Conference on Flood Resilience – Experi-ences in Asia and Europe
Centre for Water Systems College of Engineering, Mathematics and
Physical Sciences University of Exeter
Harrison Building North Park Road Exeter EX4 4QF
Phone: +44 (0)1392-723732 Fax: +44 (0)1392-727965 E-mail: [email protected]
Please contact us to find out more about any of the items in this newsletter
CWS Newsletter