Redução de perdas físicas empregando a setorização de redes de distribuição de água: estudo de caso Cocalzinho de Goiás

Abstract

Population growth in cities has increased the demand for water in various regions of the world. This consumption requires the search for new sources of water to supply. However, there is in many countries considerable quantity of water lost in public water supply systems. In Brazil, the loss in water distribution is high, mainly in the north and northeast of the country where the inefficient management and lack of investment in the water sector are most evident. Thus, on the one hand it is necessary to join efforts and resources to expand the supply (production), on the other hand it is also necessary to manage the demand, especially nowadays where the scarcity of natural resources is already quite evident and severe. Thus, it is necessary the development of mechanisms for distribution systems simulation, as well as actions designed to combat water loss in the country. In this context, the aim of this paper was to develop and implement a sectorization design of water distribution networks to the city of Cocalzinho de Goiás-GO, in order to improve the system operation with consequent reduction of non-revenue water in the distribution. Pressure, flow, and particularly the night minimum flow were evaluated for the design of the project, correlating them with the non-revenue water before and after the sectorization of networks from January 2015 to January 2016. The hydraulic modeling of the water supply system was performed using EPANET 2 software and the calibration using Epanet Calibrator. The calibration of the modeling enabled design the sectorization project that was implemented in the period. In the conditions that the study was performed, it can be concluded that the sectorization of water networks, even without the use of pressure reducing valves, and through the control of night minimum flow enabled the average reduction of real losses by 19%. The best result was obtained for the month of December 2015 which recovered 32.4% of volume lost when compared with December 2014.