Implementing Advanced Technologies and Asset Management to Help Prioritize and Rehabilitate Critical Pressurized Pipeline Infrastructure
Abstract (short): The condition of pressurized pipeline (both water and wastewater) has been in significant decline since the mid-1970s. It’s getting worse by the decade. Solutions are needed sooner-than-later! This presentation will give a brief overview of these needs and advanced tools and technologies available to cost-effectively renew these systems. It will also include an overview of how asset management, using a risk-based modeling approach, can be used to select those assets which are highest in priority for renewal and rehabilitation.
Abstract (introduction): Pressurized pipeline infrastructure throughout the US is reaching a critical stage of condition. The outlook of this infrastructure as recently described in ASCE’s 2021 Report Card (and statewide individual report cards in each successive years) shows that the trend line of system deterioration is getting worse, in particular, for both water and sewer conveyance systems. Quite frankly, this trend will not change direction in a positive manner, unless a number of critical steps are undertaken. The report is quite clear that the only feasible way to address this rapidly increasing rate of pressurize pipelines for both water and sewer infrastructure deterioration is through asset management and the will of elected offices to fund these programs. Specifically, it states that “Asset management provides utility managers and decision-makers with critical information on capital infrastructure assets and timing of investments. Some key steps for asset management include making an inventory of critical assets; evaluating their condition and performance; developing plans to maintain, repair, and replace assets; and funding these activities”.
The hardest ones are also those that need to address the systems that are pressurized 24/7/365 with no room for holidays and time off. To turn this corner and establish better and more reliable information on the actual condition of these buried and essential pressurized assets, several recent (and, frankly, pretty cool) advances in performing both external and internal inspection and assessment of pressurized pipelines, wastewater force mains, valves, hydrants, and other ancillary facilities has moved the level of understating condition and remaining useful life (RUL) to new levels. With these technologies and established protocols for determining their associated risks, cities and utilities are starting to bring this all together under effective asset management (AM) planning so that the three pillars of AM can be managed: sustainability, reliability, and efficiency. We can turn this around and do with confidence.
Mark G. Wade, P.E., President
BlueWater Solutions Group, Inc.
Biography: Mark is President and a Senior Pipeline Technologist for BlueWater Solutions Group. This includes a wide range of buried pipeline infrastructure for municipal, commercial, federal, and industrial clients. Throughout his 46 years of experience in consulting engineering he has accumulated a broad range of experience for the improvement and management of water, wastewater, and stormwater conveyance systems. This includes planning, modeling, design, and asset management services. He has managed more than 1,100 projects and programs related to buried pipeline systems in North America, Southeast Asia, New Zealand, and Europe. Mark has also authored and presented nearly 100 technical papers related to conveyance system evaluation and rehabilitation. Several have been published in trade magazines, journals, manuals-of-practice, and books. He currently provides senior-level technology and project management oversight for several sewer assessment and rehabilitation projects, particularly large-diameter conveyance systems, in Colorado, Texas, Missouri, Mississippi, Florida, Kansas, and Iowa.
