Abstract
Water loss management (WLM) in water distribution systems (WDSs) is generally time consuming, costly and difficult. Therefore, the most appropriate methodology should be defined based on the current status, requirements and technical capacity of the utilities. In this study, a novel WLM model was developed to improve the WLM practices, to define the most appropriate and applicable targets and to determine the components that need to be improved primarily using the Harris Hawk Optimization (HHO) algorithm. Firstly, a total of 144 components in the CSAS proposed by Bozkurt et al. (Welcome Sigma J Eng Natural Sci 40:1–13, 2022b) are scored in three utilities. The averages of current scores in utilities are 3.4167, 2.9792 and 1.1597, respectively. Then the most appropriate targets were defined with the optimization algorithm by considering the current situation and the dynamic structure of utility. The target scores defined by optimization model in utilities are 4.4097, 4.3958 and 3.2292, respectively. This novel model will contribute to the prevention of time-consuming and costly processes by determining the most appropriate progress. It is thought that this study will provide significant benefits for creating a road map for practitioners in WLM.