A coupled approach for the three-dimensional simulation of pipe leakage in variably saturated soil

authored by

Aaron Peche, Thomas Graf, Lothar Fuchs, Insa Neuweiler

Abstract

In urban water pipe networks, pipe leakage may lead to subsurface contamination or to reduced waste water treatment efficiency. The quantification of pipe leakage is challenging due to inaccessibility and unknown hydraulic properties of the soil. A novel physically-based model for three-dimensional numerical simulation of pipe leakage in variably saturated soil is presented. We describe the newly implemented coupling between the pipe flow simulator HYSTEM-EXTRAN and the groundwater flow simulator OpenGeoSys and its validation. We further describe a novel upscaling of leakage using transfer functions derived from numerical simulations. This upscaling enables the simulation of numerous pipe defects with the benefit of reduced computation times. Finally, we investigate the response of leakage to different time-dependent pipe flow events and conclude that larger pipe flow volume and duration lead to larger leakage while the peak position in time has a small effect on leakage.

Organisation(s)

Institute of Fluid Mechanics and Environmental Physics in Civil Engineering

External Organisation(s)

Institute for Technical and Scientific Hydrology (itwh) GmbH

Type

Article

Journal

Journal of hydrology

Volume

555

Pages

569-585

No. of pages

17

ISSN

0022-1694

Publication date

26.10.2017

Publication status

Published

Peer reviewed

Yes

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Water Science and Technology

Sustainable Development Goals

SDG 11 - Sustainable Cities and Communities

Electronic version(s)

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2017.10.050 (Access: Closed)