Vulnerability Assessment of Urban Sewer Networks Against Industrial Discharges Using RAMCAP Method, Case Study: Tehran City

Ghorbani, Aghil; Hashemi, Seyed Hossein; Bashiazghadi, Seyed Nasser

doi:10.22112/jwwse.2025.459259.1402

Vulnerability Assessment of Urban Sewer Networks Against Industrial Discharges Using RAMCAP Method, Case Study: Tehran City

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

Aghil Ghorbani ¹

Seyed Hossein Hashemi ²

Seyed Nasser Bashiazghadi ³

¹ M.Sc., Environmental Science and Engineering, Faculty of Environment Science, University of Shahid Beheshti, Tehran, Iran.

² Associate Professor of Environmental Technologies, Faculty of Environment Science, University of Shahid Beheshti, Tehran, Iran.

³ Assistant Professor, Faculty of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Khavaran Institute of Higher Education, Mashhad, Iran.

10.22112/jwwse.2025.459259.1402

Abstract

Since in many regions and due to different reasons, there are industrial plants inside urban or suburban areas, and their produced wastewater may discharge to urban sewer network. In this study, vulnerability of urban sewer networks against industrial discharges which can enter high flow and pollution loads to sewers and cause damage to wastewater facilities (pipes) was identified and determined. For this purpose, the sewage network of District 21 of Tehran, which includes many industrial units, was selected as a case study, and related information was collected. Then the assets and specific threats related to the network were identified. After that, the severity of assets damages which were caused by any probable threat was determined. Finally, the vulnerability index of pipes as the assets of the sewage network was ranked and calculated using the RAMCAP method based on their diameter in the range of low, medium, and high risk. The results show that the most important threats caused by industrial discharges to the urban sewer network are release of chemical pollutants and dramatically changes of industrial discharges quality which can create physical damage of urban wastewater facilities and their dysfunction. Out of a total of 75 pipes in the network, 6 pipes have high risk, 10 pipes have medium risk, and the remaining 59 pipes have low risk.

Keywords

Sewer network

Industrial wastewater

Pollution load

Risk

Network assets

RAMCAMP

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