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GENERALIZED SENSITIVITY ANALYSIS OF WATER DISTRIBUTION SYSTEM VULNERABILITY TO DELIBERATE INTRUSIONS

KHANAL, NABIN
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1123791754

Abstract Details

2005, MS, University of Cincinnati, Engineering : Environmental Engineering.
This thesis presents a two-part investigation on the vulnerability of municipal water distribution systems to deliberate biochemical intrusions. In part 1, intrusions were modeled as a steady 6-hour injection of a soluble conservative contaminant into a randomly selected node on the pipe network of a small town. The propagation of the contaminant through the water distribution system was tracked with EPANET and, at the end of 72 hours, the fraction of the town’s population exposed to the contaminant was estimated. This was repeated for multiple injection nodes randomly dispersed across the network. A dimensionless “Exposure Index” (EI) was introduced as a simple global measure of network vulnerability: an EI value of 0 implies that no residents are exposed to the contaminant; an EI value of 100 implies that all residents are exposed. In addition, results of the intrusion simulations were used to construct a “Zone of Influence” map which categorizes the network nodes on the basis of their exposure potential. In part 2, a Generalized Sensitivity Analysis (GSA) was performed to identify which, if any, of four dynamic network variables (base demand, storage capacity, mass loading and injection duration) had a significant influence on the percentage of population exposed to the contaminant during an intrusion. Latin Hypercube Sampling was used to set-up 1152 biochemical assault simulations at each of three injection nodes. The nodes were selected on the basis of their exposure potential (high, medium or low) as indicated on the Zone of Influence map. Based on the Kolmogorov-Smirnov d statistic, simulated exposure levels were found to be most sensitive to variations in base demand and mass loading. Tank capacity and injection duration tended not to be important. More work is needed, however, to identify appropriate measures of population exposure. This exercise demonstrates that GSA holds promise as a robust tool for streamlining computationally intensive network simulation experiments.
Dr. Steven Buchberger (Advisor)
170 p.
Engineering, Environmental
Generalized Sensitivity Analysis; Water Distribution Network; Deliberate Intrusion; Vulnerability

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Citations

  • KHANAL, N. (2005). GENERALIZED SENSITIVITY ANALYSIS OF WATER DISTRIBUTION SYSTEM VULNERABILITY TO DELIBERATE INTRUSIONS [Master's thesis, University of Cincinnati]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1123791754

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • KHANAL, NABIN. GENERALIZED SENSITIVITY ANALYSIS OF WATER DISTRIBUTION SYSTEM VULNERABILITY TO DELIBERATE INTRUSIONS. 2005. University of Cincinnati, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1123791754.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • KHANAL, NABIN. "GENERALIZED SENSITIVITY ANALYSIS OF WATER DISTRIBUTION SYSTEM VULNERABILITY TO DELIBERATE INTRUSIONS." Master's thesis, University of Cincinnati, 2005. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1123791754

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

ucin1123791754
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© 2005, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by University of Cincinnati and OhioLINK.