Strategic Sensor Placement for the Identification of Disinfection Byproducts from Chlorinated Drinking Water: Case Study in the Water Distribution Network of Coimbra, Portugal

Providing clean drinking water to people worldwide is a challenging task due to the contaminants that tend to form in water distribution systems at any point in time, causing various health impacts to the consumers. An emerging contaminant with not well-known effects on human body is the family of disinfection byproducts (DBPs) occurring in chlorinated drinking water. Due to the complexity of their formation, it is very challenging to monitor and detect DBPs in a water network. By placing sensors throughout the distribution system, it becomes feasible to monitor certain environmental parameters that affect their formation and identify locations in the network which have high probabilities for the detection of DBPs. The problem is complicated due to the large number of possible DBPs and the constrained number of sensors available, thus a clever approach needs to be followed, especially in cases where prioritization of DBPs needs to be considered. In this work, we propose a methodology for detecting DBPs, considering a real-world case study of a calibrated water distribution network in Coimbra, Portugal. Different algorithms are investigated to satisfy different performance objectives, aiming to locate the best possible locations for sensor placement, toward maximizing possible detection and minimizing overall impact of DBPs.