CIV5313 Asset Management- Planning For a Sustainable Future

CIV5313 Asset Management

Tasks

Background

Asset Management is about planning for a sustainable future. The essence of good asset management is being able to defend today’s decisions and to demonstrate that the long term impacts of short term decisions can be made clear to stakeholders.

Decisions rely on data; good decisions rely on good data. Therefore asset data is the absolute key to ensuring that the right decisions have been made. Data has to be fit for purpose and should be able to articulate asset condition, functionality and levels of service. In addition, organizational data should be able to reflect “what has been done in the past” in order to predict “what is likely to happen in the future”.

An organization that can claim to have good asset management systems and processes is one where:

  • Data collection methods are consistently defined throughout the organization.
  • Data is repeatable and reliable.
  • There are means and capable resources for converting data into information.
  • There is sufficient knowledge in the organization about the history of maintenance.
  • There is good use of life cycle models to determine long term funding needs for existing assets.
  • There is a robust means of ensuring that assets are sustainable – i.e. costs of maintaining new assets into the future are identified and the costs of maintaining existing assets in the future are minimized.

In this assignment you’ll develop an asset management plan for a selected asset type. There are eight tasks including selecting an asset type, identifying data needs, predicting future condition, maintenance needs, performing economic analysis and preparing a maintenance plan.

Assignment:

1. Select an organisation and an asset type for the assignment. It will be useful if you are familiar with the organisation and the asset. Make sure that the asset you select is of reasonable size and is used substantially by the community. Also make sure that there is sufficient historical performance data for the chosen asset type as you’ll need them for your analysis. For example you may choose roads, bridges, buildings, traffic lights, etc. Describe the reasons for selecting the asset type. Also ensure you have the necessary permission to use and publish the data.

If you have difficulty in finding required data, the lecturer may be able to provide you with a set of data related to pavement assets.

Source of all data must be referenced. [10% marks]

2. Conduct a literature search of any investigation that has been undertaken for this asset in the recent past by the organisation. This could include community surveys, condition data reports, maintenance backlog reports and specific legislative or governance case studies including asset management objectives. Summarise your findings in relation to the following: [10% marks]

  • Type of data that has been used for asset management.
  • Validity of this data and its usefulness.
  • Ability to use the information in future decision making i.e. impacts of these findings on what we need to do in future.

3. For the selected asset type, identify the goals/objectives of the organisation and develop a robust ‘data needs analysis’. Clearly identify the type of data you need and list if any information is not available. Any assumption must be justified. [10% marks]

4. Develop a data collection methodology for the data you identified in Task 3. Inventory and performance data must be included in your analysis. The methodology should include data collection method, frequency and equipment. [10% marks]

5. Identify level of service and performance measures for the asset type and assess current condition. If available use simple performance models to predict future asset conditions. Prediction of future asset condition will help determining maintenance needs. Where performance models are not available, you will need to find out the organisation’s practice of predicting asset condition and assessing maintenance needs. Justified assumptions on performance models can also be made to determine future asset conditions. [10% marks]

6. Using the performance models in Task 5, identify the maintenance needs and alternative treatment options. In this task you should identify what treatment is required, where and when. You may consider ‘do-nothing’ option as a base case. You should identify at least three options/strategies. [15% marks]

7. Perform life cycle analysis for the above options/strategies (in Task 6) and recommend the best treatment option/strategy using a suitable analysis period (say 20 years). Using the recommended option, prepare a maintenance program for the next five year (i.e. 5- year-maintenance-program).

Justify any assumption you make. [25% marks]

8. Assume the management agrees to spend only 60% of the total budget you require for the five-year plan (equal amount in every year) in Task 7. How would you convince the management to increase the budget? (You should consider using life cycle analysis and showing how the reduced budget impacts asset condition and serviceability). [10% marks] 

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