Key Terms
Alternate Operating Procedure: Used when operational conditions require that an asset or process be modified or taken off-line; scheduled; periodic
As-Built: Engineering drawings showing the system or components of the system at the time of construction
Asset: Anything that a system owns that is used in it's operations; in this context, asset refers only to physical assets or components of physical assets and NOT to financial assets (e.g. bank accounts, bonds, etc.)
Asset Condition: An assessment of the continued usability of a piece of equipment or building or plant
Asset Inventory: A listing of all the assets owned by a system with information on age, condition, location, remaining useful life and value of each
Asset Location: The actual physical whereabouts of an asset; an important component of the asset inventory
Asset Management: A technique of managing the assets of a system or community that seeks to meet a required level of service in the most cost-effective way through the creation, acquisition, operation, maintenance, rehabilitation, and disposal of assets to provide for present and future customers
Asset Management Plan: A written document outlining the elements and implementation of the asset management plan
Buy-In: The extent to which various employees within the system accept the tenets of asset management and the need for implementing them
Capital Improvement Plan: A document that lists the large equipment purchases or construction projects that a system anticipates it will need in upcoming years (ideally should be done for a 20 year time frame, updated annually)
Capital Improvement Reserve: A fund created specifically to accumulate monies for anticipated capital expenditures
Condition Assessment: A relative ranking system that rates the overall condition of each asset according to a scheme determined in advance (e.g., 0-5 or A- F); an important component of determining criticality and allocating maintenance resources
Consequence of Failure: An assessment of the total costs of all the ramifications of the failure of an asset (includes cost of repairs, social costs, costs of collateral damage, legal costs, environmental costs and public health costs)
Core Component: One of the five major elements of asset management (asset inventory, level of service, critical assets, life cycle costing and long-term funding strategy)
Corrective Maintenance Procedures: Used by field technicians for the repair of assets that are malfunctioning; activities undertaken to detect, isolate and rectify a fault so that the failed equipment, machine or system can be restored to its normal operational state
Cost Related to Collateral Damage: The cost of repair or replacement of other assets as a result of the failure of an asset (e.g., repair of payment after a main water line break causes a sinkhole)
Criticality: An assessment of the importance of each asset in terms of its liklihood of failure and the consequence of failure; an importance component of an asset management plan
Current State of the Asset: An assessment of the condition, age, location, remaining useful life and value of an asset at the current time
Emergency Operating Procedure: Used in emergency conditions; incorporated into overall emergency plan developed for utility
Environmental Costs Related to Failure: An assessment of the environmental impact of the failure of an asset; may be monetary or qualitative
Failure: The inability of an asset to do what its users want it to do; occurs any time the asset is not able to meet the level of service the system wants
Full-Cost Pricing: A rate-setting method that seeks to recover all present and future costs of operating the utility
