Leveraging WERF Tools and Resources for Strategic Asset Management

In 2007 the Water Environment Research Foundation (WERF) began a research initiative to develop tools and practices for utilities to use to communicate and implement their own Strategic Asset Management (SAM) programs. Since that time, WERF SAM research has been instrumental in improving knowledge management within the industry. Working closely with WERF, EMA, Inc., as well as GHD, CSIRO, MWH, and Virginia Tech conducted research to help identify and share the leading asset management practices, tools, and strategies available to meet the evolving needs of wastewater utilities. The Project research was executed under four major tracks with a total of five phases, which took place during a six-year time period.From its inception, the goal of the WERF SAM project has been to help utilities run their operations more like a business and recognize that asset management is a management model that can be used to help them become more sustainable by minimizing life cycle costs and maintaining the level of service that their customers require at an acceptable level of risk to the organization.This paper discusses how utilities can leverage the tools and resources developed in the WERF SAM project to develop and fortify the strategic asset management program within their organizations regardless of where they are in their program.