Wei Liao, Professional Water Asset Manager/Lead Research Engineer is guest speaker at Alliance of Indiana Rural Water Spring Conference
Wei Liao, PWAM
Lead Research Engineer
Construction Engineering and Management
Purdue University
West Lafayette, IN
WEI'S STORY
Ms. Wei Liao is an underground construction professional appointed to assist the team at Purdue University in the Construction Engineering and Management Department with expanding the focus on Developing Underground Space. As a tunnel engineer for 14 years, she has experience in highway tunnels and underground engineering survey, design, construction, maintenance, and research. Since 2019, her research focuses have been on underground infrastructure asset management and technologies for construction and maintenance of underground engineering facilities. She has received a certificate of completion for all 4 of the Buried Asset Management Institute-International (BAMI-I) CTAM (Certification of Training in Asset Management) courses. She is the lead developer of BAMI-I’s next generation CTAM program and has been appointed to BAMI-I’s Board of Directors. She is editor of the new BAMI-I Journal. She has been certified by NASSCO (National Association Sewer Service Companies) on Pipeline Assessment Certification Program (PACP), Manhole ACP and Lateral ACP. She has received the BAMI-I PWAM (Professional Water Asset Management) certification. She is active with the WIT (Women in Tunneling) in SME (Society of Materials, Metallurgy & Exploration).
WEI'S RESEARCH
Title: Asset Management -A Critical Component for meeting water utility funding gaps challenge
Description: According to the ASCE 2021 Report Card, America’s Infrastructure graded an overall C- to the state of U.S. water infrastructure generally gets a low-grade: drinking water getting C- grade, stormwater getting D grade, wastewater getting D+ grade. It indicates that most of these infrastructures are in poor physical condition and may not meet current and future demands. Additionally, they are suffering from a big funding gap for improvement and improper operation and maintenance. ASCE especially noted: Maintenance backlogs continue to be an issue, but asset management helps prioritize limited funding. For Drinking water, ASCE suggests that Utilities should implement asset management programs, tools, and techniques to evaluate asset condition and risk, and to prioritize capital and O&M decisions; states should provide funding, training, and technical assistance for asset management programs. For wastewater, ASCE suggests that Infrastructure owners should engage in asset management practices across infrastructure sectors to extend the lifespan of assets and prioritize limited funding. Asset management must include continuous assessment of the condition of assets and prioritize investment decisions based upon a comprehensive suite of data.
This presentation will introduce the basic concepts and the key components of asset management. And analyze why asset management is a critical solution to address water utility funding gaps. Some value resources will be introduced, such as BAMI-I certification training Asset Management (CTAM) courses, advanced technology, advanced tools, etc.
Learning objective: Understand the importance of asset management to utilities. Become familiar with basic asset management concepts and components. Learn to understand some training, techniques, tools and other useful resources