Introduction

This document is written within the overall concept of management of assets, which is an activity all organizations undertake in some manner and to some degree. It focuses on the details of managing the physical assets at the operational level rather than the organizational (corporate management, structural or process) level.

Drinking water utilities are reliant on their assets to deliver their services to users in their service areas. The assets (e.g. reservoirs, wells, treatment plants, pumping stations, underground pipes and storage tanks) collectively form the physical infrastructure of drinking water utilities and are the consequence of the accumulated capital investments and operational expenditures on maintenance and rehabilitation over many years. In many of these utilities, the replacement value of these past investments will amount to many millions (even billions) of US dollars depending on the size of the community served. The infrastructure represents a major societal investment in essential services contributing to public health and the protection of the environment.

In many countries, these assets have been identified as critical infrastructure and programs are in place to ensure their protection or their sustainability. Like many other organizations with assets, drinking water utilities undertake programs of activities to manage the assets to ensure they continue to meet the needs of the community for reliable delivery of drinking water. These management activities can be at the strategic, tactical or operational level. The activities can be part of a formal management system, the result of specific legislative requirements, or simply the result of due diligence by the service operators and managers.

This document can serve as a supporting document for utilities operating an asset management system regardless of whether or not the utilities make use of any management system standard, for example ISO 55001.

In many countries there is a recognized sustainability problem, sometimes referred to as the infrastructure gap, which recognizes that, for various reasons, the infrastructure has not been maintained over the years on a truly sustainable basis, i.e. funding and implementation of rehabilitation programs have been postponed, with a focus instead on short-term repairs or an allowed decrease in the level of service provided.

The condition of water infrastructures greatly influences the adequacy of the drinking water service from the aspects of quality, quantity, pressure, safety, reliability, environmental impact, sustainability, degree of treatment and efficiency. Drinking water system condition-based rehabilitation approaches serve to meet these requirements with a focus on a holistic approach of condition-based, risk-oriented maintenance.

As the installation and development of water assets matures, the optimization of drinking water infrastructure will become necessary in many places in order to compensate for ageing and wear and tear, and to respond to changing societal and economic conditions. Consequently, water infrastructure assets are subject not only to ageing and wear and tear but also to adaptation processes resulting from growth, new legislative requirements, technical innovations or users' changing service-level expectations. This requires drinking water utilities not only to focus on maintenance and rehabilitation but also to keep future requirements and developments in mind. Rehabilitation will thus become essential in the management of assets, with ever more stringent requirements on the design and execution of rehabilitation.

In recent years, much effort has been applied to the whole issue of management of assets on two levels:

— What are the principles and structure of an asset management system?
— What are the good practices that can be implemented on a technical level to assess the condition of the assets and help decide when asset interventions (repair, renovation or replacement) should take place?

This document describes the information required and how to collect and process reliable inventory, condition, operational and context data about technical assets of drinking water systems, including failures. These data should be the basis for a systematic management of assets and can be used for benchmarking purposes. A reliable database that supports analysis of failures and of operational data (including a description of the condition of facilities or units) is of particular significance when establishing a risk-based investigation to determine maintenance and rehabilitation priorities.

This document also provides advice on how to define a strategy for management of assets with regard to the overall performance expected by the drinking water utility and other stakeholders. It includes several aspects of operation and maintenance, including asset condition assessment and investment strategies (new assets and rehabilitation).

The usual and expected goal in the effective management of assets is to provide an appropriate service life while fulfilling given requirements in a cost-effective manner.

This document is intended to provide guidance on the assets typically owned or operated by drinking water utilities (waterworks – including collection, treatment, pumping and storage) that are expected to meet users' needs and expectations over longer (multi-generational) periods.

Additional information on objectives for management of assets of waterworks is provided in Annex A. An outline of the content of a drinking water master plan is provided in Annex B. Examples of inventory, condition and operational data are provided in Annex C. Methods for the risk-based assessment for rehabilitation are shown in Annex D.

BS ISO 24516-2:2019

Guidelines for the management of assets of water supply and wastewater systems - Waterworks

Current

Published:

31 May 2019