Conference Agenda

Urban drainage networks are ageing and deteriorating, however as they are predominantly buried it is difficult and costly to inspect these assets to understand their condition. Furthermore, data on these networks can be missing or unreliable, creating significant challenges for effectively managing these vital assets. Changes in flows due to urbanisation, population and climate, as well as tightening regulations for environmental and public health protection increase the requirements on water utilities for management of these assets. Inspection technologies are subject of much research, however in the near and midterm future there will remain uncertainties around the condition and status of many assets. It is therefore important that utilities can better target inspection and intervention to optimally manage their urban drainage networks. The poster will present analysis of asset and operational failure data from several urban drainage networks supplied by two UK water utilities. Self-organising maps will be utilised to improve understanding of these datasets and show where there are commonalities and differences between the studied networks.