Reducing greenhouse gas emissions from water distribution systems using multi-objective optimisation and variable speed pumping

Abstract

Global warming caused by human activities presents serious risks. Every government and industry can and should contribute to the mitigation of global warming by reducing GHG emissions, and the water industry must play its part. In order to tackle this challenge, GHG emission minimisation has been previously incorporated into the optimisation of water distribution systems (WDSs) via a multi-objective approach, in which fixed speed pumps (FSPs) were used. This study investigates the possibility of further reducing GHG emissions from WDSs by incorporating variable speed pumps (VSPs) in multi-objective WDS optimisation. One case study is used to demonstrate that by switching to VSPs, both economic costs and GHG emissions of the Pareto-optimal solutions obtained using FSPs can be reduced.