Optimizing water delivery system storage and its influence on air pollutant emission reduction

• Optimizing storage operations in a large water system.
• A quantitative approach to estimating pollutant emission reduction based on energy conservation.
• Identifying 26 tonnes of carbon dioxide emission reduction on the maximum demand day.

This paper presents a quantitative approach to estimating the carbon dioxide (CO2) emission reduction by optimizing water storage operations in water delivery systems. This approach uses hydraulic models of water delivery systems to perform pumping energy optimization analyses with equalization water storage and identifies marginal electrical generation types based on locational marginal price (LMP) data available in open electrical markets. The marginal pollutant emission reduction has been evaluated based on pumping energy optimization, hourly marginal generation types and pollutant emission rates for different types of generation. An example is presented that applied the proposed approach to a large water delivery system in the Metro Detroit area, Michigan. The analysis results showed a daily CO2 emission reduction of 11.7 tonnes, which accounted for approximately 3% of the total CO2 emission produced by the electricity consumption for pumping water under the maximum day demand condition of 2012.