Aging infrastructure is a significant concern for maintaining stormwater systems. All too often, asset failures or emergencies arise due to uncertainty about the location and condition of infrastructure assets and a lack of comprehensive planning. Asset management programs (AMPs) can help reduce unexpected, expensive, and reactive repairs and increase overall system performance and reliability. An AMP is a scalable strategy that is suitable for both large and small communities. For small communities, an AMP can serve as the basis for developing revenue and financing strategies to ensure long-term stormwater infrastructure sustainability. For large communities, an AMP can become the foundational element for prioritizing capitol improvement projects and optimizing financial resources.
Deciding whether to implement an AMP
No asset lasts forever; instead, assets decrease in functionality, effectiveness, and reliability over time. With regular maintenance, assets can continue to function as designed for their intended lifetimes. AMPs provide a structured approach to optimizing the life cycle cost of asset ownership while meeting regulatory and service objectives. Life cycle costing not only considers the initial capital cost of the asset, but also identifies and documents all costs over the lifetime of the asset.
Proven benefits of an AMP include:
- Reducing and stabilizing long-term costs. AMPs can help systems perform at their desired service levels and help operators make expenditures (from focused repairs to general replacements) only at the most economically beneficial points in their assets’ service lives.
- Ensuring financial transparency. AMPs help ratepayers understand major capital expenditures and rate increases while providing decision-makers with accurate cash flow forecasts.
- Providing a framework for prioritizing a municipal stormwater program’s critical projects and meeting its targeted level of service. A framework can forecast as much as 100 years of maintenance, refurbishment, and appropriate funding in advance of an asset’s failure (see Resources).
- Giving municipal stormwater programs the data they need to project future failures. AMPs reduce the potential for catastrophic failures that often lead to environmental degradation and regulatory non-compliance.
The overarching goal of an AMP is to reduce—and ultimately prevent—facility failure “surprises” that wreak havoc on customer needs and municipal stormwater program budgets.
AMPs reduce environmental impacts from facility maintenance approaches that wait until an asset breaks to fix it. For example, enhanced sewer system maintenance can reduce blockages or pipe failures (and resulting backups and overflows) and improve treatment performance to ensure compliance with permit effluent limits.
Common AMP Benefits
While benefits will vary by municipality, potential benefits of AMPs include the following:
- Reduce overall costs for both operations and capital expenditures.
- Establish adequate user rates and stabilize future rate increases based on sound operational and financial planning while also providing transparency to customers and stakeholders.
- Prolong asset life cycles and enhance long-term asset performance.
- Provide confidence in capital planning regarding rehabilitation, repair, and replacement decisions.
- Reduce life cycle costs through better-focused resource use.
- Enhance the return on investment for capital spending and increase the efficiency of resource allocation.
- Enable programs to meet defined level-of-service goals and customer expectations with a focus on system sustainability.
- Enhance community desirability, ultimately growing the tax base.
- Improve budgeting with a focus on asset maintenance/replacement critical to sustained system performance.
- Reduce environmental impacts and enable programs to meet regulatory requirements.
- Improve emergency response.
- Improve asset security and safety.
- Improve integration with flood control and water quality programs.
Understanding the process for implementing an AMP
There are several steps to implementing an AMP:
- Identify the overall AMP scope:
- Identify the types of assets that comprise the system.
- Consider the relationship of each asset type to the system’s overall performance.
- Prioritize assets based on the system functionality and the desired level of service.
- Consider both hard assets and other types of assets (e.g., natural and soft) that enhance overall system performance.
- Establish the desired level of service:
- Establish a reasonable level of service that also accounts for NPDES permit compliance needs.
- Determine what assets needed to provide this level of service.
- Develop and routinely evaluate performance measures to track whether you are meeting your level-of-service objectives.
- Choose asset management software:
- Determine whether the AMP warrants unique asset management software.
- Choose or develop a software product that can help you catalogue and score assets and that can ensure the system’s functionality, as well as help meet your level-of-service and regulatory objectives.
- Catalog assets:
- Invest time up front in cataloging assets to help understand the components of your systems.
- Establish a standard for defining, identifying, and storing asset data to keep those data consistent and correctly labeled.
- Score assets:
- Recognize the appropriate metrics, standardize a methodology, and choose a perspective to create a consistent system.
- Evaluate the condition, remaining useful life, probability of failure, and consequence of failure (or criticality) of each asset to determine its overall score.
- Continue AMP development:
- Establish internal evaluation and benchmarking standards using a set of predetermined criteria.
Selecting AMP software and tools
Due to the vast amount of information needed to implement an AMP, you must have an effective tool (or tools) to store asset catalogs, asset condition scores, and maintenance schedules, as well as to identify assets most in need of attention. Before choosing among the multiple AMP software products available, talk with other departments to determine if they are using existing asset management software for transportation, wastewater, or other assets that could fulfill your needs.
Some municipal stormwater programs have purchased off-the-shelf asset management software (refer to New Mexico Environmental Finance Center [2006] under Resources), but it can be expensive and may not be necessary for smaller programs that do not operate large, complex systems. Other programs have created in-house databases, which may take significant time but can connect all relevant data across different information systems and establish a robust, program-specific ranking system to identify the most critical projects. While off-the-shelf and in-house asset management software may provide similar capabilities, it is important to understand how the software will be incorporated into daily operations and what features add the most value.
To choose the best product, draw on a combination of information sources, such as your list of critical assets (including asset score and rank, if already available), evaluations of work order histories and cleaning histories, and institutional knowledge. Also, consider ease of use by your staff and ease of incorporation into existing AMP tools and practices.
Factors to Consider When Choosing Software
When choosing software, consider the following factors:
- Initial and maintenance costs.
- Resource investment needed to train staff.
- Intuitive user interface.
- Ability to integrate with other applications already in use, such as GIS; computerized maintenance management software; the sewer system management plan; and cost management, labor tracking, purchase order, existing asset management databases, and accounting systems in other departments.
- Configurability.
- Enterprise access.
- Analytics to prioritize asset management activities.
- Ease of collecting field data (mobile device input).
- Inclusion of various operational modules, such as:
- Work order module
- Service request module
- Asset inventory module
- Condition inspection module
- Budgeting and valuation module
- Reporting module
- Inclusion of and communication with a mobile application (with adequate capacity).
- Ability to collect data.
- Inclusion of unique infrastructure assets, particularly for stormwater systems (e.g., green infrastructure).
Case Study: South Lake Tahoe, California
The city of South Lake Tahoe used a request for proposals process to choose an AMP software product. Two proposals were deemed to best fit the city’s needs, and the consultants were invited to give a live demonstration. The city chose one option and implemented the software, which has many benefits—including its budgeting and cost tracking ability. But implementation of the software has also involved some challenges. These include resistance of staff to institutional change, training of maintenance staff unfamiliar with the technology, a data collection effort that was more expensive and time-consuming than anticipated, and difficulty locating assets that the initial data collection effort did not identify.
Case Study: Folsom, California
The city of Folsom uses GIS software to display certain collection system asset information, such as pipe locations, materials, and sizes; manhole rim elevations and depths; and locations of pump stations, force mains, and sewer laterals. These data were incorporated with the city’s computerized maintenance management system (CMMS) to avoid duplicate and conflicting databases. The city uses the GIS software to store static asset information, such as size, material, length, and slope, whereas the CMMS stores dynamic operation and maintenance information.
Cataloguing assets
An asset catalog (also known as an asset register) is a database used to document and maintain specific information about a municipal stormwater program’s assets. Key variables to capture in such a catalog include each asset’s location, age, vendor-specified useful life, and recommended maintenance schedule.
While conventional AMPs typically include only hard assets, such as storm drain system pipes, catch basins, and pump stations, consider including other asset types, such as soft assets (i.e., human-based resources) and natural assets (i.e., program-managed, naturally occurring resources). Also consider taking a staged approach to identifying the types of assets that make up the system. Consider the relationship of each type of asset to the system’s overall performance, and prioritize assets based on the system functionality and desired level of service. Initially focusing on the largest and most critical assets, followed by gradual inclusion of less critical facilities, can help prevent you from becoming overwhelmed.
Smaller systems or those just beginning the asset management process should recognize that including natural and/or soft assets can make it more complex and challenging to get basic AMP steps in place.
Case Study: San Diego, California
In developing an AMP for its stormwater system, the city of San Diego included hard assets with more than $5,000 in replacement costs, as well as natural assets (such as receiving waters, discharges, and land) and soft assets (such as public opinion, policies, and relationships). To comply with its NPDES MS4 permit, the city acknowledged in its Watershed Asset Management Plan that it must manage soft assets, including public behavior and relationships, regulatory relationships, monitoring equipment, ordinances and land development standards, the quality of water running into and out of its storm drain system, and the quality of water in the receiving water bodies. Although natural and soft assets cannot be replaced, the city included them in its Watershed Asset Management Plan to account for the funding needed to manage these assets at the level of service required by NPDES regulations and desired by customers.
Defining levels of surface and measuring AMP effectiveness
Establishing and defining a desired level of service for the stormwater system to provide to its customers is critical to developing and gauging the success of an AMP. Generally, higher levels of service require more resources and a larger commitment from municipal stormwater programs.
EPA’s “Asset Management for Sewer Collection Systems” fact sheet states that the basic level of service definition for most stormwater and wastewater programs will be to deliver reliable storm/sanitary sewer collection and treatment services at the lowest sustainable cost, consistent with applicable environmental and health regulations. The fact sheet also specifies that level-of-service criteria should be system-specific.
The quality, quantity, and reliability of service delivery, along with environmental standards, are elements that can define level of service and associated system performance goals—both short- and long-term. The targeted level of service, and the operations and assets responsible for providing that service, can guide you in identifying which assets to catalog and to what depth, as well as what metrics you can use to assess how well you are reaching the targeted level of service.
Many stormwater programs may have already established desired levels of service for some assets, but you should synchronize your goals with the proactive perspective of an AMP and integrate them with evolving regulatory requirements, such as NPDES permits.
Performance metrics are specific measurements designed to assess whether you are meeting level-of-service objectives. Performance metrics can vary, but commonly include the following:
- Annual performance goals for system inspection, cleaning, maintenance, rehabilitation, and capital improvement.
- Maximum response time for emergency calls.
- Customer complaints and claims for private property restoration.
Systems can also quantify the extent to which their AMP has helped them mitigate expensive reactive maintenance and replacement.
Sample Service Goals
Consider these types of broad service goals:
- Ensuring adequate system capacity for all service areas (keeping in mind that undefined system capacities can create uncertainty when identifying appropriate budget planning).
- Eliminating system bottlenecks due to pipe blockages through a staged approach (e.g., to a level of performance to not more than “X” per year for the first 5 years of operation, with a goal of Y% reduction in occurrences in each year thereafter until a level of “Z” per year is obtained).
- Replacing pipes (or inspecting more often) when they reach their service life.
- Reducing peak flow volumes through inflow/infiltration controls.
- Reducing flooding and peak flow velocity through adequate stormwater management controls.
- Providing rapid and effective emergency response service.
- Minimizing cost and maximizing effectiveness of capacity, management, operation, and maintenance programs.
Case Study: Grand Rapids, Michigan
The city of Grand Rapids went through a process of identifying a level of service that supported the following goals: 1) ensuring healthy natural resources (e.g., river, streams, lakes), 2) improving recreational opportunities, 3) strengthening the economy, and 4) making the city a more desirable place to live. The city proposed four levels of service (A–D, with A representing the highest level), each of which included various subtasks and metrics to achieve the overall level-of-service goal:
- Level A: Funding increases, comprehensive system inspection, and preventative/corrective maintenance activities. A system renewal rate of 100 years.
- Level B: Inspection and preventative/corrective maintenance activities with a more direct basis for tracking these activities. A system renewal rate of 125 years.
- Level C: Inspection and preventative/corrective maintenance activities to identify critical infrastructure and high-priority areas. A system renewal rate of 150 years.
- Level D: Existing level of service, with minimum inspection and preventative/corrective maintenance activities (i.e., corrective maintenance only for the most critically failed portions of the system).
The city calculated a cost of achieving each level of service, accounting for asset replacement at the end of each asset’s estimated effective life, street sweeping, maintenance, studies and planning projects, and NPDES regulatory and development compliance. The city ultimately chose to work toward level C. This decision assumes that the city can double the effective life of infrastructure through rehabilitation and replacement. It includes capital investment for green infrastructure practices.
Addressing challenges and barriers to AMP development
Despite the demonstrated benefits of AMP implementation, the challenges and barriers that can come with developing a new AMP—or integrating existing asset management tools into a formal, centralized AMP—can seem overwhelming at the beginning of the process. Some of the most common challenges—and strategies to overcome them—include:
- Identifying and cataloging assets. This is often an immense job, especially for stormwater programs that are generally unaware of their assets and the characteristics of those assets. Essential staff in various capacities (management, operations, maintenance, information technology, consultants) must collaborate closely to ensure that the appropriate assets are identified and characterized in a manner that will allow a well-functioning AMP to meet your desired level of service.
- Obtaining buy-in and support from key stakeholders and decision-makers (e.g., operations and maintenance staff, engineers, information technology department managers, finance staff, customers, department directors, city council, board of directors) at the onset of AMP development and at each critical step along the journey. You can overcome this challenge by showing the cost savings of an AMP over the long term.
- The perception that decades of deferred maintenance or neglect need to be rapidly addressed. You can overcome this concern by showing that the AMP can help your community develop an economical cash flow plan for infrastructure replacement.
- Reluctance to catalog assets due to the potential liability risks of discovering failing assets that could cause property damage prior to their repair or replacement. You can mitigate these liability risks by developing a comprehensive plan for addressing those assets, with management and public support, and by consulting early and often with your legal team.
- Perceived costs and staff effort associated with the AMP planning, software, startup, and ongoing operation. You can demonstrate that an AMP is a long-term investment that will have a high return on investment over the life of the assets.
- Perceived difficulties, and even redundancy, of creating and maintaining yet another activity tracking and/or work order system. You can mitigate these concerns by integrating as many existing activity tracking and work order systems into your AMP.
- Difficulty in effectively communicating the benefits of an AMP to management personnel and stakeholders. You can overcome this by developing and sharing a list of projected AMP benefits.
- Difficulty incorporating the AMP into existing data management systems. You can mitigate this by performing a functional assessment of your existing systems to determine its usefulness in an envisioned AMP. You can then determine if the existing system can be modified and used or if a new system is required.
- Finding consensus among key stakeholders regarding the appropriate level of service. You can overcome this by obtaining buy-in early in the AMP development process.
Obtaining Buy-In
Various strategies exist for obtaining support from key stakeholders and decision-makers, but the key to all these strategies is showing the benefits of reducing and stabilizing long-term facility operating, maintenance, and renewal costs—the “no surprises” approach. The bottom-line strategy is to help decision-makers understand that preventing problems is far less costly and disruptive than fixing problems and their trickle-down consequences.
A Tool for Tracking Asset Attributes
Identifying relevant assets—as well as the appropriate level of detail to track—can be difficult. For example, a municipal stormwater program might struggle to determine the relevance of different types of assets to overall system performance, the value of privately owned assets that contribute to the system, or even the importance of assets in different geographic areas of the system (i.e., downstream assets versus assets near the boundaries of the system).
Using a comprehensive tool to track the various attributes of assets (e.g., location, age, maintenance schedule, condition) can help stormwater programs and municipalities more fully understand their complex systems. One valuable tool to help you understand your current asset management proficiency assets is the Asset Management IQ Test developed by the Southwest Environmental Finance Center and sponsored by the Kansas Department of Public Health and the Environment. This tool uses a score-based approach to help you explore your current level of need on a number of asset management criteria. The questionnaire’s 30 questions are divided into six areas. You can retake the test periodically to assess your progress in each of these areas and determine where you should apply resources.