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Faculty of Engineering, Built Environment and Information Technology
School of Engineering
Department of Civil and Biosystems Engineering
Selected Highlights from Research Findings
During 2004 the Water Division of the Department of Civil and Biosystems Engineering was involved in two projects funded by the Water Research Commission. The first project entitled Factors influencing the friction loss in pipelines and the relationship between water quality, operating conditions and the performance of different liner systems and pipe material identified the factors which influence friction loss in pipelines. One of the main factors identified was the couplings. An experimental set-up simulating varying coupling mechanisms as well as numerical modelling (CFD) proved this. Another important factor was the biofilm layer forming in pipe systems. The invention of the Rotoscope that identifies the extent of biofilm growth was one of the highlights of the research. The biofilm growth was also characterized on typical pipe materials.
The second project entitled Application and conceptual development of genetic algorithms for optimization in the water industry (Phase 2) resulted in the conceptual development of Genetic Algorithm (GA) procedures for pipeline optimization, network optimization and Water Resources Assessment optimization. The use of GA has been conceptually developed for water resources assessment where the Water Resources Yield Model (WRYM) and Water Resources Planning Model (WRPM) are used. Furthermore a GA front-end interface that optimizes water distribution systems has been developed for the public domain software EPANET. The results of the developed optimization procedure were tested against benchmark problems that have been reviewed by numerous international researchers and the results are extremely promising: the computational time of the optimization process has been reduced and the repeatability improved.
Contact person: Prof SJ van Vuuren.
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