Many-objective optimisation tool for the design of district metered areas in pumped water distribution networks

The establishment of district metered areas (DMAs) is a highly effective method to mitigate operational management difficulties and enhance the efficiency of water distribution networks (WDNs). There are several objectives associated with the DMA's design that are contingent upon the network parameters that are affected by its formation. Two previous studies considered DMA design as a three-objective problem (operational cost, average pressure and water age) and a four-objective problem (design cost, pressure deviation, resilience index (RI) and demand shortfall) for pumped and gravity networks, respectively. The problems were addressed through the implementation of a multi-phase DMA design methodology using the NSGA-II and NSGA-III optimisation tools, respectively. The present work builds upon previous research by simultaneously considering five objectives in DMA design (i.e. design cost, operational cost, RI, average pressure and water age) using the NSGA-III optimisation tool in pumped water networks. In this extended approach, the pump's role in meeting nodal demands eliminates the necessity of including demand shortfall as one of the objectives. The proposed methodology has been evaluated on two benchmark networks, demonstrating its capability to identify DMA alternatives and provide solutions based on user preferences. Finally, the obtained results are compared with the previous study's findings.