Are Failure Rates on All Water Distribution Systems the Same? (Comparing Predictions among Nine Utilities in Southeast Florida)

The goal of asset management is to identify and track the maintenance and identify the need for replacement of assets that have reached their useful life. For that reason, gathering data and collecting information is a critical step when developing an asset management plan. However, for buried infrastructure, information is often missing and due to its location, observing actual condition is not possible. Many entities lack the resources for examining buried infrastructure without destructive testing, so other methods of data collection are needed. The concept for this paper was to determine if utilities located in the same geographical vicinity could contribute data to develop regional scale predictive means to assess the likelihood of failure of buried potable water mains (failure defined as breaks). Such an effort would be more accessible to utilities and result in an easier means of assessment. The findings indicate that utilities located in the same area may differentiate themselves by pipe material, and the lack of data collection inhibits the ability to use predictive means with confidence.