Advances in modeling and management of urban water networks

This Editorial presents a representative collection of 15 papers, presented in the Special Issue on Advances in Modeling and Management of Urban Water Networks (UWNs), and frames them in the current research trends. The most analyzed systems in the Special Issue are the Water Distribution Systems (WDSs), with the following four topics explored: asset management, modelling of demand and hydraulics, energy recovery, and pipe burst identification and leakage reduction. In the first topic, the multi-objective optimization of interventions on the network is presented to find trade-off solutions between costs and efficiency. In the second topic, methodologies are presented to simulate and predict demand and to simulate network behavior in emergency scenarios. In the third topic, a methodology is presented for the multi-objective optimization of pump-as-turbine (PAT) installation sites in transmission mains. In the fourth topic, methodologies for pipe burst identification and leakage reduction are presented. As for the Urban Drainage Systems (UDSs), the two explored topics are asset management, with a system upgrade to reduce flooding, and modelling of flow and water quality, with analyses on the transition from surface to pressurized flow, impact of water use reduction on the operation of UDSs and sediment transport in pressurized pipes. The Special Issue also includes one paper dealing with the hydraulic modelling of an urban river with a complex cross-section.