WDN-Tailored Edge Betweenness for Analysis of DISTRICT METERING AREAS Planning

Many complex systems of the real world can be modeled as networks using the complex network theory (CNT). Water Distribution Networks (WDNs) are special infrastructure networks connecting vertices, named nodes, by means of edges, named pipes, which are material elements transferring water to customers. Considering the spatial characteristics of WDNs, there is the need for tailoring CNT metrics in order to analyze the domain of hydraulic equations as useful tool for analysis, planning and management tasks, before and after the hydraulic simulations. In the last decade, several researchers studied the behavior of spatial networks and more recently CNT has been used for domain analysis of WDNs. In fact, the WDN domain features drive the emerging hydraulic behavior while the application of the momentum and continuity equations and boundary conditions specifies the hydraulic status.

This work proposes and discusses the WDN-Tailored Edge Betweenness, a new CNT metric obtained starting from the classic edge betweenness and tailoring it in order to capture the domain features of the hydraulic systems. The paper applies such novel centrality metric to support planning WDN District Metering Areas (DMAs) in order to evaluate the modification in the network domain due to the districtualization (i.e. closed gates). Based on a real case study, the original WDN-Tailored Edge Betweenness and those related to various DMA solutions were compared to gain information about the vulnerability and new relevance of pipes/ paths.