Optimal Design of Pipeline Based on the Shortest Path

Design and operation of long-distance pipeline are complex engineering tasks. Even small improvement in the design of a pipeline system can lead to substantial savings in capital. In this paper, graph theory was used to analyze the problem of pipeline optimal design. The candidate pump station locations were taken as the vertexes and the total cost of the pipeline system between the two vertexes corresponded to the edge weight. An algorithm recursively calling the Dijkstra algorithm was designed and analyzed to obtain N shortest paths. The optimal process program and the quasi-optimal process programs were obtained at the same time, which could be used in decision-making. The algorithm was tested by a real example. The result showed that it could meet the need of real application.