The continuous monitoring of water quality within water
transmission and distribution systems has been extremely
limited and rare in practice due to the high capital and O & M
costs and the low level of reliability and accuracy of the
generated data. Grab sampling remains the main method for
assessing the deterioration of water quality between a treat-ment plant and the end users. The experimental research
presented in this paper aimed to improve our understanding
of the changes in water quality due to the inherent unsteady-state hydraulic conditions in operational systems. The
acquired hydraulic and water quality data show that
unsteady-state hydraulic conditions can significantly affect
the deterioration of important water quality parameters. A
key component of this research was to integrate, develop and
evaluate novel technologies for the acquisition of hydraulic
and water quality data. These technologies provide a unique
insight in the dynamic hydraulic and water quality processes
occurring in large scale water transmission and distribution
systems which to the best of our knowledge has not been
previously demonstrated.
Existing technologies for continuous water quality sensing
in distribution networks include reagent and membrane
based sensors adapted from technologies used in water
treatment plants. Complex and costly installation setup, the
reliability of the sensors and the accuracy of the acquired data
have significantly hindered their application for proactive
water quality management of water supply systems. These
limitations encourage the development of novel sensor tech-nologies. The use of reagent-free electrochemical sensors for
in-pipe water quality monitoring is one of these develop-ments. A detailed evaluation of electrochemical and optical
sensors under controlled laboratory conditions and in opera-tional systems, which this paper presents, is a decisive
prerequisite for their use and integration with network
models for near real-time operational control and contami-nation risk assessment. The multi-parameter sensor probe
which has been used for this experimental study (Intellisonde)