Optimum operation of a multiple reservoir system including salinity effects

Many studies have been carried out regarding the development of optimum operating policies for multiple reservoir systems but few of these have considered water quality as an objective. This study considers operations of the headworks system for Adelaide, Australia. The system is rather unusual because of its high salt concentrations which impose large economic costs on the consumers. In addition, a significant fraction of the supply is pumped from a distant river. An existing linear programming model for operation of the Adelaide system is modified to identify policies which minimize total system costs (including salt damage costs). These changed procedures can reduce the average salinity of the supplied water significantly but at some increase in annual pumping costs. The benefit‐cost ratio of the changes is estimated to be 3.0 for the entire system.