Battle of the Water Sensor Networks

A mixed-integer linear program is used to design the sensor location problem to detect potentially harmful contaminations in drinking water distribution systems. The size of data report time step is investigated as a mean to simplify problem formulation and solution identification. The uncertainty on the cost function value due to the size of the report time step can be explicitly calculated. This allows the designer (1) to estimate the theoretical cost function lower bound and thus to decide if a design is acceptable and (2) to establish a rational criteria for determining a meaningful size of the contamination event ensemble.