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UTILITY WEEK | NOVEMBER 2020 | 41 Operational Excellence You can quote me… "Network assets are generally being reported as health- ier than they really are and that's not helped companies in their business plans when they are looking to replace assets which over the RIIO1 period have been reported as healthy… if you put garbage in, you get garbage out." Peter Bingham, chief engineer, Ofgem "In Europe, where many companies have talked about green recovery, hydrogen has featured very heavily in their investment scenarios for achieving that. It is our opportunity here in GB as well." Chris Train, Gas Goes Green Champion "We could install valves today that are hydrogen-ready, as some of our European peers are doing, but those come at a very high cost premium. Our focus is on demonstrat- ing the impact hydrogen has on the kind of technology we have in place now… and really trying to understand how much more investment would be needed to make our assets ready for a hydrogen network." Mark Lissimore, head of engineering and asset manage- ment, National Grid Gas Transmission "RIIO1 successfully tackled long interruptions – a focus that was based on consumer views. I understand that a number of views are now coming forward and highlight- ing the crucial importance of the short term as well, and that is driving asset performance thinking – not just in the UK, but equally in the US, Australia and elsewhere." Grant McEachran, regulatory affairs director, S&C Electric Company "We've learned a lot from Covid… We've gained confi- dence as an organisation that we can change quickly. Previously, we've assumed we are perhaps not good at change, but the last few months have shown we can be brilliant at it." Annabel West, head of engineering policy and business governance lead for Covid-19, SGN "Whichever system you use to collect data and share it in a coherent way, we need to be moving strongly towards self-registration so devices can register them- selves on whichever system the consumer or the asset holder wants with as little friction as possible." Richard Dobson, Practice manager – data systems, Energy Systems Catapult "We as network operators and infrastructure owners are not inherently data companies. We are asset manage- ment organisations at heart and we are having to evolve to learn the capabilities and the disciplines you need to become more data centric and insight driven." Matt Webb, head of asset information, UKPN "Too oen I see organisations model and develop a great plan on paper but one that isn't grounded in the opera- tional context of how they can deliver the work." Stefan Sadnicki, managing director EMEA, Copperleaf Highlights from day two Improving risk-based decision making Among the many pressures of the RIIO2 framework for asset management professionals is the Introduction of Network Asset Risk Measures (NARMs), which ask network companies to pro- vide thorough evidence of the need for intervention in the asset base predicated on the deemed risk of failure combined with the expected impact of failure for any given asset. It's no surprise, then, that several presentations dedicated some time to setting out how companies are trying to improve their approaches to data-led risk-based decision making. ENW's head of asset management, Jonathan Booth, spoke in detail about how the DNO has been working to integrate data from multiple different sources – such as the core asset register, geospatial systems and control systems – to create a more com- plete picture of the potential consequences of asset failure. "If we know the physical location of, for example, a link box, this enables us to match it with the geospatial set on where foot- fall is," explained Booth. "So we can bring together and identify not only the condition state of a link box but also whether it's located outside an area that might have significant footfall (that is, a school, bus stop, etc) and therefore assess the risk of that link box failing." Historically, this has all been brought together via a manual process to extract datasets and integrate them together but recent technology investments have introduced labour-saving automation. Another company that has been working hard to improve its risk-based decision making and develop a holistic picture of which actions will lead to the best risk management outcomes for its asset base as a whole is Northern Gas Networks. Speaking about the company's journey toward asset manage- ment maturity, asset strategy lead Ian Coates emphasised the importance of understanding: "The decision to make an interven- tion on an asset is also the decision not to intervene on another. It's important to understand both the impact of the intervention but also the residual risk of those assets in the portfolio that will not receive the intervention." More detail about NGN's asset management transformation programme and the approach to asset investment planning which received plaudits form Ofgem in its RIIO-GD2 submission, can be accessed in a dedicated webinar on the topic available free and on-demand at: utilityweek.co.uk Popula�on typically draws on different sources… 7 of average HI 1 HI 2 HI 3 HI 4 HI 5 C1 <75% C2 75-125% C3 125-200% C4 >200% Need to understand the condi�on of the asset and its resultant failure risk Need to understand the role the asset plays in the network Loca�on Duty Observed Condi�on Measured Condi�on Reliability Modifier Age Loading Customers Typically held within the control system Typically held within a geospa�al system Typically held within an asset register A slide from Jonathan Booth's presentation highlighting typical networks approaches to manually gathering data from a variety of sources about asset condition, location etc in order to form an understanding of the risk of failure and consequence of failure for a specific asset. Day 1 Day 2 in association with