A review of the pressure transient effects on water distribution main failures

This paper presents a review of pressure transient effects on water pipeline failures. Water distribution mains in the world are becoming older and hence are experience more frequent failures. Prediction of pipe failures become very important as the failure of large diameter pipes could lead to high consequences of failure (economic as well as social) such as property damage, interruption to traffic and the loss of confidence in the water utility. The most challenging task is to predict such failures which can depend on several factors that are hard to estimate accurately. Among such factors, internal water pressures, pipe corrosion and traffic loads and can be paramount. Most of the failures of large water mains reported in the literature occurred as a result of high internal water pressure acting on corroded sections of the pipes. Hence, evaluation of steady state as well as transient pressures in the water network is particularly important in the process of pipe failure prediction. This paper reviews the state of the art of pressure transient modelling to determine the failures of water mains. Relevant failure prediction methods have also been identified to predict the failures of corroded as well as non-corroded water pipes associated with high transient events. The use of pressure transient modelling has been elaborated with the aid of a case study to determine the failures of corroded water pipelines