A review of the relationships between pressure and burst in water supply systems

Besides reducing leakage and consumption, pressure management affects occurrence of new bursts in water supply systems. Over the past two decades, several researchers throughout the world have studied the benefits of pressure management on reduction in the burst frequencies. During this period a wide assortment of empirical models have been developed to determine pressure-burst relationships such as pressure-leakage relationships. This paper aims to conduct a comprehensive review of these studies, relationships and empirical models pertaining to the effects of pressure management on the break rates of pipes in water supply systems. For this purpose, the developed relationships and empirical models by various researchers over the last twenty years were discussed and the advantages and disadvantages of them were summarized. Based on the review, the better understand of pressure- burst relationships could be founded and the results could be used in the analysis and evaluation of pressure management schemes in water supply systems.