Methodology for leakage isolation using pressure sensitivity and correlation analysis in water distribution systems

Leakage detection in hydraulic networks can be addressed through inverse analysis. However, the typical approaches found in literature have not been supported by experimental measurements, and no quantitative indication on the influence of the uncertainty of the hourly consumption patterns on efficiency of the objective function is available. The water consumptions of two small towns were measured for over a year, thus allowing detailed analysis of the evolution of the consumption patterns. This information was used to improve the leakage identification by contextualizing the inverse analysis on small-sized hydraulic networks.