Asset management means different things to different people. But it boils down to converting raw data and observations about equipment and components into information and knowledge that is then used, propagated, and shared by workers and digital components to manage performance. Nuclear plants have special asset management needs, given the level of their safety, reliability, and regulatory requirements.
Due to the demanding nature of nuclear power plants’ operations, their asset management strategies are inherently complicated. For example, a person at a nuclear plant who is responsible for the performance of a pump might refer to the online condition-monitoring system, together with the operator rounds of data collected regularly, periodically, or intermittently, as asset management. Indeed, asset management, as described in basic engineering technical specifications for a new nuclear plant, may only cover the plant-level definition (Table 1). Yet it is so much more than that.
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| Table 1. Not so simple. Asset management at the plant level might be synonymous with a condition-monitoring system and analogous to other plant functions, such as operations and performance monitoring, maintenance management, and reliability-centered maintenance. Source: Pearl Street Inc. |
At the owner/operator executive level, the asset management system is probably thought of more in terms of the business management systems (such as those supplied by SAP, IBM, and Oracle), which specifically link to the power plant data and digital systems. The distinction often made here is between the corporate information technology (IT) system and the operations technology system. But it is not just that either.
In between the plant workers and the executive suite are several other critical elements of “asset management,” including the off-line or periodic condition-testing data, other monitored process and supervisory variables, and predictive analytics software, all of which can be combined with work processes and procedures to form the reliability centered maintenance (RCM) system.
Any or all of the elements just described have logical interfaces with the computerized maintenance management system, stores and inventory management systems, central or corporate engineering department, centralized or multi-asset portfolio performance-monitoring facility, outage planning and scheduling processes, and so on.
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