The Star Gold Coast set the scene for our much anticipated AMCouncil Excellence Awards last night. Congratulations to winners:
Asset Management Innovation Award
Transport for NSW in conjunction with CBS Group – “Project CAPITAL ( Commercial Asset Performance, Infrastructure Tailoring And Lifecycle) Framework”
The CAPITAL framework represents an innovative long-term asset management and commercial model designed for critical infrastructure. Initially implemented for the Western Harbour Tunnel and Sydney Harbour Tunnel, it establishes a 30-year, fixed-fee asset management, operations and maintenance framework that optimises asset performance while balancing risk allocation. CAPITAL incorporates formal collaboration mechanisms, and drives design simplifications in new and existing assets – ensuring clear traceability of customer needs and hazards to design features and value – formalising options and analysis and rewarding an innovative asset manager. It ensures long-term community value is protected by; applying commercial levers like lane-rental fees to reflect the impact of maintenance, defining strict asset condition requirements as guardrails for asset value, and provisioning sophisticated lifecycle funding mechanisms.
Asset Management Information Management Award
Southern Ports – “Deployment of Asset Management System and Digital AMBoK”
Southern Ports has transformed the way it manages its 8,700 assets and its overall business approach through the development of an asset management system that has helped revitalise its complex and aging asset base, shifting it from a state of disrepair to one of efficiency and resilience. Central to the transformation is the placement of asset management knowledge at the fingertips of every employee with the developed of the organisations digital AMBoK.
Asset Management Cost, Risk, Performance Award
Essential Energy – “Bushfire Priority Zone Transition Project – Targeting Bushfire Risk Management to Where it Matters Most”
- Enhanced risk modelling has led to the re-zoning of Essential Energy’s highest bushfire risk areas ,with 3,850km of powerlines requiring enhanced risk treatment that includes overhanging vegetation removal.
- The volume of vegetation removal is the equivalent to a years’ worth of existing vegetation removal activity for Essential Energy, representing significant delivery and funding challenges for the business.
- The Bushfire Priority zone Transition (BPT) project was established in late 2023 to define, plan, design, estimate, obtain funding and commence delivery of a plan to better manage the risk of vegetation in the vicinity of powerline assets.
Asset Management Sustainability Award
Sydney Trains – “Asset Lifecycle Optimisation for Plain Track and Turnout Resurfacing Programs”
This project introduces a Big Data-Driven Track Asset Lifecycle Optimisation (ALO) framework, implemented for both plain track and turnout resurfacing programs. In response to the community’s need for safe, reliable, and sustainable rail infrastructure, it leverages asset management principles to optimise funding and asset performance, ensuring that people’s needs, environmental factors, and organisational value are integrated to achieve sustainable outcomes. By integrating eight years of track geometry data, maintenance logs, and environmental risk factors derived from twenty-five years of environmental and track defect data, it accurately models track condition degradation, quantifies treatment effects, and simulates both short- and long-term maintenance requirements and deliverable scopes. The approach transitions from cyclic and corrective strategies to predictive maintenance, focusing on must-attend and preventive interventions. It prioritises interventions based on asset performance, criticality, cost-effectiveness, and environmental impact. By dynamically allocating budgets and bundling work, this framework minimises service disruptions, improves asset longevity, and delivers tangible value to rail operators and communities.
Asset Management Resilience Award
Endeavour Energy – “Self-Healing Network”
Endeavour Energy strengthened its network’s resilience against the growing impact of climate events to meet customer expectations and maintain service levels. To enhance network monitoring and control the organisation introduced an Advanced Distribution Management System. This system also paved the way for advanced operational solutions such as Fault Location Isolation and Service Restoration (FLISR). This technology allows the network to autonomously isolate faults and restore power to downstream customers by back feeding through adjoining feeders. Commonly referred to as a “self-healing network,” this approach improves resilience by reducing the severity and consequences of outages.
Asset Management Safety Award
Energy Australia – “Process Safety Underpinning Asset Management in Operational Readiness”
Tallawarra B is a new power generation plant located in the Wollongong region of NSW, adjacent to the existing Tallawarra A power plant on the shores of Lake Illawarra. The goal of the Tallawarra B Operational Readiness Team was to ensure the new asset transitioned form construction to operation safety, successfully and sustainably. A systematic process was required to consider risks. The key elements of originality in the solution were primarily in the use of best-practice bowtie audit templates to drive operational readiness before the asset had been handed over and the site had much knowledge of the asset.
Asset Management Diversity Award
Service Stream – “Engineering a Diverse Workforce”
Service Stream’s commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) is central to its vision of being Australia’s leading essential network services provider. This commitment is driven by two core areas: fostering a diverse, equitable, and inclusive workplace where all individuals are welcomed; and offering comprehensive technical and leadership development opportunities. These opportunities include formal internal and external training, on-the-job learning, and clear internal promotion pathways. By focusing on continual learning and development, Service Stream ensures its workforce has the skills and support needed to deliver high quality asset management and maintenance for Australia’s most critical infrastructure networks.
Rising Star Award – Shuwen Ling
Shuwen is a high achiever with impressive credentials and experience at such a young age. She holds a master of civil engineering qualification, a bachelor of commerce, finance and Management and received Melbourne School of Engineering Exchange Scholarship to New York University in 2017. Nominated by her peers at AusNet Services who tell us that What stands out most about Shuwen is her ability to balance stakeholder expectations, time constraints and delivery of complex work under pressure. While still early in her AusNet career, she has already become a go-to person for colleagues seeking advice and guidance on ISO55001 matters. Shuwen is passionate about improving society through better asset management and ensuring that our industry moves toward more sustainable, effective practices. She consistently shows integrity and a willingness to go the extra mile to ensure quality outcomes, and she advocates for the professional growth of others in the field. Her leadership, as Chair, of the Young Asset Management Practitioners (YAMP) group at the Asset Management Council, as well as her presentation at AMPEAK last year on Empowering the next generation of AM practitioners demonstrates her willingness to contribute to the wider asset management community. In Shuwen’s own words “Investing in future leaders within the industry is not merely a choice but a strategic imperative”
Life Member Award – Glenn Ingram
Glenn has served on the AMCouncil Board for 12 years and has been a member of AM Council since the MESA days. He has contributed to the AMCouncil in many roles and also ben generous in sharing his knowledge to contribute to GFMAM projects and certification scheme projects.
Best Paper Award
Dr Bing Liu – “Track Asset Life Cycle Optimisation with Big Data-Driven Degradation Modelling and Predictive Maintenance”