Portsmouth Water – Data Being Used as an Asset
Portsmouth Water’s information systems have been in place for many years and were developed to support strategic parts of the business such as customer service, job management, water quality management and leakage control.
These information systems, whilst effective in delivering a quality service to customers, do not fully support across-the-business analysis and do not effectively allow related information to be considered against a common definition of a water company asset.
WRc were commissioned to define an asset-centric data model that could be developed to support a forward-looking asset-based information strategy. The project needed to establish the basis for an information platform that would enable the company to effectively manage their capital and operational expenditure for both above-ground and below-ground assets.
An initial desk study, undertaken by WRc, determined the broad information requirements needed. The study addressed all asset types and took account of the end-to-end process service provision outlined in the Capital Maintenance Planning Common Framework. Detailed workshops were then conducted with staff from different functional disciplines across the business to develop a detailed data model.
The detailed data model identifies the required asset attribute data together with the linkages to the related systems providing job, incident, performance, financial, customer, property and spatial information. It provides the framework against which existing IT systems can be developed and establishes the basis for an integrated asset-based information strategy.
The next phase of the project will be to implement the asset data model to bring immediate benefits by providing a means for reviewing capital planning and operational activities across the business. It will also provide the basis against which future corporate solutions can be developed.