Evaluation Of Water Treatment Plant And Distribution Network Performance Of Naqamte Town, Oromiya, Ethiopia

Abstract

In many developing countries including Ethiopia water supply system has the problem of hydraulic performance, water loss or leakage is the growing concern. Additionally, Disinfection By-Product is another problem available in water treatment and distribution system. The objective of this study was evaluating the performance of Naqamte town water distribution networks and treatment plant. Hence, during this study, hydraulic performance, water loss in water distribution system, disinfection and disinfection by-product was addressed. To evaluate the hydraulic performance of the water distribution network, WaterGEMs V8i was adopted for water distribution modeling and for water treatment plant simulation WatPro 4.0 software was applied for disinfection and treatment plant performance. This study requires some tools, Geographical Position System and pressure gauge meter that was used to collect the required elevation data, while Microsoft Excel sheet was also used in organizing elevation data, and ArcGIS 10.3 was used to display the overlapped shape file of the distribution network on the topographic map of the town. The study was involved both primary and secondary data, the primary data was received from field surveying (pressure reading and elevation). While the secondary data was collected from different newspaper, journals, related books, literature reviews, design report, the town water supply service office existing documents and annual. As per the analyzed results; the current maximum water demand in Naqamte town is estimated at 12,345.36 m 3 /day, while small reservoirs capacity and low raw water pump efficiency were observed in the town water distribution networks. As per the discussion held with the Naqamte water supply and sewerage authority and field visit, the major factors of water loss was identified. As per the calculation result; the treatment plant efficiency of the town was estimated as 69.75%. In case of giardia and viruses reduction (22.6% and 75.34%), i.e. the results obtained from the treatment plant simulation did not obey the surface water treatment rule. Despite its small amount; disinfection by products has been found in the town’s water treatment plant. As per the calculation obtained; the contact time of the water system did not met the contact time requirement because 0.476<1. In general, the current water distribution network and treatment plant of Naqamte town was in poor performance and were not conducted adequate water to the various demand categories of the town. Hence, it is important to rehabilitate and improve the water distribution network and treatment plant of the town in order to fulfill the required need.