Meeting the needs of the population in hot and cold water is one of the key tasks of housing and communal services. Despite the development of private engineering, trunk networks are still, if not the only, then the key source of water. Today, centralized water supply is a complex infrastructure complex of pipelines, as well as intake and distribution stations. At the same time, each functional unit is improved from year to year, gaining new technical and operational capabilities.
Definition of a centralized water supply system
First of all, general concepts should be developed that are somehow related to the infrastructure and mechanisms for providing the population with water. For example, the water supply system itself is a complex of functional units related to the preparation, processing, distribution and delivery of the target resource. Drainage - on the contrary, provides processes for the acceptance of waste water, discharging effluents into sewer and drainage channels. In turn, centralized water supply is a full range of engineering structures and communications involved in the withdrawal, preparation and disposal of water within a specific settlement. When developing a water supply system for the population, the following requirements are taken into account:
- The uninterrupted supply of the resource in sufficient volume and in accordance with hygienic standards.
- The sufficiency of the power head when supplying water.
- Providing opportunities for the full distribution and regulation of flows.
In other words, all consumers of the served settlement should receive water of optimum quality in the established volume and around the clock. Breaks may only be emergency or technological in nature.
The main components of the system
Conventionally, all the components of the central water supply infrastructure can be divided into two types: natural and technical (artificial). The first include water sources and objects of natural drainage, and the second components can be represented as follows:
- Head functional structures. These are the objects involved in the treatment, pumping, acceptance and preparation of water. For example, centralized drinking water supply necessarily includes sedimentation tanks, filtration and treatment plants.
- Communication networks. These are mainly reservoirs and water supply systems, due to which water is taken, transported, distributed and supplied to target consumers.
Both groups of structures closely interact with each other, ensuring the coordinated work of hydrological highways.
Water sources
The structure of water supply is determined by many factors, but the main one can be called a source of water. Its characteristics matter - power, location, quality composition, etc. More often, water is taken from surface sources, which include rivers, lakes, reservoirs, as well as artificial reservoirs. Surface sources are divided into coastal, channel and bucket. This type ultimately determines the configuration of the connection of piping lines to the fence. Often used and underground sources for centralized water supply - these are artesian wells, groundwater, topwater and other hydrological systems located in the upper layer of the earth's crust. In both cases, the same requirements apply to the place of water intake. The site must ensure the proper quality of the resource, the constancy of its replenishment and protection against pollution during pumping.
Differences between hot and cold centralized water supply
According to the requirements of SNiP, the settlements of the Russian Federation must be provided with both hot and cold water with the support of the same quality of the resource. The difference between these delivery loops will be in the individual regulatory requirements. So, for cold water supply the following standards apply:
- A 24-hour uninterrupted supply should be provided throughout the year. The duration of interruptions in the supply of cold water is not more than 8 hours in the total volume for a month (not counting emergency outages).
- The composition must comply with SanPin standards.
For centralized hot water supply, generally similar requirements apply, but with some additions. For example, in the event of an accident at a dead end, a one-time shutdown of water can last no more than 24 hours. Deviations in temperature indicators can be no more than 3-5 ° C depending on the time of day.
Pros and cons of a centralized water supply
The advantages of using the main water supply networks include stability, protection from external pollution and a minimum of maintenance work on the resource delivery circuits. If we talk about the shortcomings, then the water of centralized water supply requires financial maintenance, in contrast to autonomous sources like the same artesian well on the site. There may also be problems in supplying a private house with a large number of consumption points. The use of water for domestic and household needs in an integrated form can affect, in particular, pressure fluctuations.
Conclusion
The organization of centralized water supply can be done in different ways. Today, a system is increasingly being used in which several main risers serving separate areas are combined into a single network. This allows you to optimize the cost of ensuring the operation of pumping equipment and treatment plants. At the same time, centralized water supply is to some extent a private service system. Home plumbing infrastructure may well be involved in finer preparation of main water before consumption and also include mechanisms for processing effluents at the outlet. Another thing is that in each case, a specific set of resource service elements varies depending on the technical capabilities and personal requirements for water.