Leak Localisation Methodology and Real Applications

The leak localization community is very active and the Research Centre for Supervision, Safety and Automatic Control (CS2AC) is specially implicated in such an important issue. We have developed a methodology for leak localization using pressure measurements and hydraulic models. It is based on the fault detection and isolation theory and it evolved from a first version where binary residuals were generated to a correlation based method. This methodology was successfully applied in real networks. The improved leak localization approach includes contributions from other disciplines such as sensor placement, demand calibration and the accuracy assessment. This paper shows the evolution of a methodology due to the continuous work of a research team. First the algorithm is described. Results obtained in real networks are compared with those obtained in simulation. Finally, the new improvements of the methodology and the current challenges are presented and discussed.