Analytics across the asset life cycle Analytics provides a powerful look forward so that asset rich organisations can chose to react or not to react with changes to the conditions and environment that their assets operate within. This knowledge can inform their decisions to position the assets and improve efficiency and the service customer s experience. Organisations ability to forward look is enhanced as they mature through asset management (ISO 55000) and utilise data good practices such as those detailed in ISO8000 and building information modelling (PAS1192). This maturity has increased data availability, the analytical capability of individuals, strengthen the processes associated with decisions and the expectations of the stakeholders. This forward look will help in three elements of planning cost assessment, cost recovery and delivery. Cost assessment is about determining what is required to deliver an organisations objectives. The required costs will be quantified by an organisation investigating scenarios such as what is the most cost-beneficial solution, or what is the optimal solution for our customers or in times of reduced expenditure, what is the solution of least regret. Cost recovery is whether the stakeholders are prepared to fund and how they are prepared to fund it. Once funded the work must be delivered given the resourcing and skillsets available.
All of these elements will be enhanced through capturing risk, performance, costs and financial performance into a single environment. Trade-off between these factors can then be explored so that the best scenario can be identified and taken forward. SEAMS have a long history of delivering solutions to challenges throughout the asset lifecycle. These approaches are provided in the diagram below with references to case studies with demonstrable benefits that have been realised by our clients. Design and Build Design and Build is an important part of asset life cycle as it sets out what the asset will do through its lifetime. The utilisation, operation and maintenance requirements of the asset will be set and as such the costs required throughout the lifetime. Correct decisions will result in delivering assets that will deliver for their life; wrong decisions will results in extra costs, higher risk and potential write-off of large asset values. Analytics can inform the following key questions within the Design and Build phase What will the asset deliver in service through the projected asset lifecycle and what TOTEX costs are required to support this? What is the best construction and treatment required to maximise profit through the asset lifecycle? What is the best way to finance the project given the level of service and totex options in running the project? What policies and standards should be set for the assets and the network? Approaches that SEAMS have undertaken to inform these decisions include: Whole life cost or TOTEX models - These models allow both the initial capital costs and the costs throughout the lifetime of the models to be quantified to allow the least whole life cost options to be identified. Finance models - Allows for the exploration of different funding mechanisms to recover the costs of the investment spend. SEAMS have published case studies covering this part of the asset life cycle, including the London Borough of Bromley case study. Other projects that cover this phase is the Bristol Water case study where the cross asset optimisation consider from a customer willingness and affordability to pay, whether investment was better targeted for constructing new assets or improving the service of existing assets. Operate and Maintain Operate and Maintain phase captures the largest stage of the asset lifecycles with some assets having lives in the 100's of years. Throughout an assets life, decisions must be must be made regarding its operation, utilisation and maintenance given environmental, political
and physical climate changes. These decision need to be resourced, the costs recovered and will constantly be subject to efficiency pressures and be adaptable as the. Analytics can inform a range of decisions through the Operate and Maintain phase Which are the most risky assets, and how often should they be inspected and/or maintained? Is the asset being operated in the most efficient manner? What assets are the most expensive to operate and what can be done to reduce these higher cost assets? What level of resource is required to deliver the reactive and proactive work of an organisation? Is the maintenance capital or operational? A range of approaches are available to SEAMS to support these decisions and include: Probability of failure and deterioration models - This covers multiple regression, Weibull and Bayesian types models. Consequence models - These models look at the consequences of failure covering financial, service, safety, network and environmental consequences. Techniques include the use of multiple regression on raw data through to simulation models looking at the impact of asset failure. Risk and service frameworks - A variety of frameworks can be used here to represent risk and service. Approaches used include mapping against a 5*5 matrix based upon asset health and criticality to quantify risk. Another option is to map service measures to willingness to pay models. Sensitivity and uncertainty models - These models allow the investigation of the impact of data and run extreme scenarios to be explored and the impacts investigated. Supply and demand models - The eternal debate of matching demand of a resource, say water or people, with the available supply of the resource. SEAMS have supplied a range of deterministic and stochastic approaches to meet these requirements. Other realisable benefits associated with the Operate and Maintain phase are: 8% reduction in the number of number of internal flooding events, with 30% saving in pollution events through scheduling the sewer cleaning activities within the network. 5% reduction in the contracting costs to service peak resource demands within the asset network.
Replace/Enhance The Replace/Enhance phase is where decisions are required as an asset reaches the end of its life and move potentially beyond it. For each asset, the decision maker has the options of: Leave it as is with the increasing operational costs are incurred on an ongoing basis. Increasing maintenance or inspection to mitigate the risk. Overhaul or refurbish to extend the life of the asset. Replace with a new one. Analytics can inform the following key questions within the Replace/Enhance phase What investment is required to maintain the asset base? What is the correct balance between opex and capex? When and how to invest in an asset to meet the corporate objectives? What is the most cost beneficial investment profile given customer s willingness to pay? The approaches that SEAMS use to support the decision making around replace/enhance decisions include: Asset investment planning (AIP) - AIP focuses on the decisions of when to invest in an ageing asset or an asset that has delivered its entire service potential. In both cases the asset is nearing the end of its life. TOTEX Portfolio programming - What is the right optioneering within the investment programme to deliver the totex savings whilst meeting the regulatory targets. Efficiency models - Efficiency is delivered through SEAMS software through better use of the data to target the right investment and right option. Models can be used to bundle the assets in the most economic way by grouping asset into project to exploit economies of scale. These approaches utilise may of the probability of failure, consequence and risk frameworks discussed in the Operate and Maintain phase of the asset life. The success of these approaches can be seen in the London Underground and Electricity North West case studies. Rationalise/Decommission/Sell The Rationalise/Decommission/Sell phase is where decisions as made on the asset being retired and what happens to the asset once it is retired. Analytics can inform the following questions within the Rationalise/Decommission/Sell phase:
What is the minimum number of assets required to deliver a resilient service to customers? Which asset or site should be retired? What value can be achieved by the selling of the asset or the land that it situated on? Approaches that SEAMS have undertaken to inform these key decisions include: Whole life cost or TOTEX models. These models allow both the reduction in operational costs of retiring assets with potential capital and operational costs by using alternative assets for delivering the service. Projects that SEAMS have undertaken where benefits have been realised from analytics projects include the rationalisation of sewerage treatment works.