The Case for Indefinite Life Facilities in Water and Wastewater Conveyance

With the increasing complexity of servicing water transmission mains and sanitary sewer force mains in urban areas, change is needed in how facilities are planned, designed, built, and maintained. This paper presents strategies for the control of external and internal corrosion/degradation of these facilities as part of a comprehensive Asset Management Program. Several strategies are available to operators, including: (1) run to failure, (2) run and repair as required until failure, or (3) operate using preventative maintenance to provide an indefinite life. The following are examples of these strategies: Operating a pipeline to total failure. Operating a pipeline until failure occurs and making point repairs as required. Operating a pipeline with preventative maintenance giving the pipeline an indefinite life span. In today’s water and wastewater industry, strategies 1 and 2 are most commonly employed. This paper examines how appropriate planning, design, building, and operation will facilitate indefinite usage of existing pipelines. Based on a review of hundreds of condition assessment evaluations of water transmission mains and sanitary sewer force mains throughout the western United States, and this presentation we present the case for a change on how water and wastewater conveyance systems are delivered to the market place.