Integrating a physical asset strategy with a data strategy to create breakthrough asset management

Restructuring of the electric utility business in the United States has unleashed powerful economic forces with consequences for both consumers and utility management. Concurrently, advancements in equipment automation and computer technologies provide opportunities to monitor and manage equipment, systems and networks to a degree only previously imagined. The convergence of these two forces creates the motivation and the methods for a new asset management strategy for transmission and distribution networks. Utility managers are currently challenged to improve system performance in ways that customers can notice and regulatory agencies can track, while at the same time lowering the costs of owning and operating T&D delivery systems. This challenge has created the need for new strategies commonly referred to as asset management. A standard definition for asset management as it relates to utility networks does not exist. By their own definition, many electric utility companies are engaged in asset management initiatives. These programs often appear to be very different from each other. It is logical to assume that common elements exist and that they include an organizational structure that yields optimized decision making for the utilization of physical assets together with measurements of life cycle cost and performance.