A Mean Field Game Approach to Urban Drainage Systems Control: A Barcelona Case Study

Abstract

Urban drainage systems (UDSs) are complex large-scale systems that carry stormwater and wastewater throughout urban areas. During heavy rain scenarios, UDSs are not able to handle the amount of extra water that enters the network and flooding occurs. Usually, this might happen because the network is not being used efficiently, i.e., some structures remain underused while many others are overused. This thesis proposes a control methology based on mean field game theory and model predictive control that aims to efficiently use the existing network elements in order to minimize overflows and properly manage the water resource. The proposed controller is tested on a UDS located in the city of Barcelona, Spain, and is compared with a centralized MPC achieving similar results in terms of flooding minimization and wastewater treatement plant usage, but only using local information on non-centralized controllers and using less computation times.