Abstract:Drip irrigation is one of the irrigation methods with the most significant water-saving effects in modern agricultural irrigation. How to improve the reliability of drip irrigation pipe network systems while reducing project investment and operation costs is a key issue that needs to be addressed urgently in optimal design. Aiming at the characteristics of machine-pressure drip irrigation, a multi-objective optimal design mathematical model for machine-pressure drip irrigation pipe network systems was established with the objectives of minimizing the annual investment cost of the pipe network, the mean value of node surplus head, and the variance of node surplus head. An improved harmony search algorithm was proposed to solve the multi-objective optimization model, along with its methods and steps. In constructing the optimization model, the pipe network system was divided into units of levels, strips, and sections, making the established optimization model universal. Taking a machine-pressure drip irrigation project in Xinjiang as an example, this method was used to optimize its pipe network. Compared with the original design scheme, the optimized scheme reduced the annual investment cost of the drip irrigation system by 4.97%, the mean value of node surplus head by 16.84%, and the variance of node surplus head by 12.47%. The optimization results showed that this method can not only effectively reduce the investment cost of the pipe network system, but also significantly reduce the mean value and variance of node surplus head, thereby reducing the pressure deviation and failure frequency of the pipe network system and improving its reliability.