EPANET

Purpose: Water distribution modeling
Developer: US EPA (Environmental Protection Agency)
Key Features: Water quality modeling; data files are importable into proprietary software
Latest Release: Version 2.00.12, March 2008
OS Platform: Windows
Cost: Free
Related Software: MIKE Urban, Bentley WaterCAD, Kentucky Pipe
Website: EPANET Homepage

Introduction

The EPANET model simulates hydraulic and water quality behavior over extended periods of time. EPANET tracks the flow of water in each pipe, the pressure at each node, the height of water in each tank, and the concentration of chemical species (EPANET User Manual) using the continuity equation and Bernoulli’s equation.. EPANET can been applied to model chlorine residual analysis, understand the fate and movement of constituents in the drinking water system, model consumer exposure, and improve water quality in the system, including pipe cleaning and changing source utilization across multiple sources in the system.

The software has several key features such as the ability to use cloud computing, access a freely available dataset when data is not available, and visualization tools. EPANET was developed by the United States Environmental Protection Agency and is available only on the Windows operating system.

Advantages and Limitations

Advantages Limitations
  • Perform extended period analysis
  • Multiple methods to compute loss
  • Program is open source
  • Output data can be exported as a DXF file
  • Program has not been updated since 2008
  • GUI interface is outdated
  • Program has no automatic calibration ability
  • Cannot process or import GIS spatial data
  • Program cannot couple with SCADA

Illustrative Screens

Sample Applications

Africa East Asia and the Pacific Europe & Central Asia Latin America & the Caribbean Middle East and North Africa South Asia
Philippines (Rehabilitation and proposed service) Mexico (Drinking Water Sectorization)

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