JOINT PROJECT PLANNING IN A CONTEXT OF MAINTENANCE AND
RENEWAL OF THE UNDERGROUND INFRASTRUCTURE: A CASE
STUDY
Master Thesis Supply Chain Management
University of Groningen, Faculty of Economics and Business
June 24th, 2019
MARLIEKE ZAAL
Studentnumber: S3491889
E-mail: m.zaal@student.rug.nl
Supervisor: Prof. Dr. Van Donk
Co-assessor: Dr. Tong
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Abstract
Purpose: The purpose of this research is to investigate how infrastructure administrators can plan and
schedule joint projects regarding underground infrastructure maintenance and renewal. Existing literature lacks an understanding of how infrastructure administrators can use information sharing to plan and schedule joint projects. Therefore, the focus will be on what information needs to be shared between infrastructure administrators, in order to successfully plan and schedule joint projects of maintenance and renewal.
Design/Methodology: A single case study has been carried out, consisting of three infrastructure
administrators. Semi-structured interviews were conducted to collect the data. Besides the collection of primary data, secondary data has been analysed, such as annual reports and policy documents of the involved organizations and available documents from third parties.
Findings: First, the findings show that planning joint projects of maintenance and renewal is a complex
process, because of different policies and ways of working between infrastructure administrators. Furthermore, the findings provide insight into the factors that influence the collaboration decision. Besides that, on a strategic level infrastructure administrators need to share multi-year plans, developments and bottlenecks. On a tactical level, they need to share a definitive design, definitive time schedule, delays, definitive agreement on collaboration and availability of resources. Sharing this information could lead to planning more joint projects.
Originality/contributions:This study contributes to the literature by giving insights into the individual differences between infrastructure administrators in planning maintenance and renewal activities. Furthermore, it provides insights into the factors that influence the collaboration decision and into the information that needs to be shared between infrastructure administrators in order to plan joint projects of maintenance and renewal. With this contribution, academia can build models related to the integration of infrastructure systems that better fits with practice.
Keywords: Plan and schedule maintenance and renewal activities; Underground infrastructure; Joint
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Table of Content
1. Introduction ... 4
2. Theoretical Background ... 6
2.1 Maintenance and Renewal of Underground Infrastructure ... 6
2.2 Joint Projects ... 7
2.3 Information Sharing Between Organizations ... 8
2.4 Conceptual Model ... 9 3. Methodology... 11 3.1 Research Design ... 11 3.2 Research Context ... 11 3.3 Case Selection ... 11 3.4 Data Collection ... 12 3.5 Data Analysis ... 14 4. Findings ... 16
4.1 Maintenance and Renewal of Underground Infrastructure ... 16
4.2 Joint Projects ... 19
4.3 Information Sharing Between Organizations ... 21
5. Discussion ... 25
6. Conclusion ... 27
6.1 Managerial Implications ... 27
6.2 Limitations and Recommendations for Future Research ... 28
7. References ... 29
8. Appendix ... 33
A. Interview Protocol ... 33
B. Consent Form ... 36
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1. Introduction
It happens regularly that a newly laid out square must be imposed again due to maintenance or renewal of cables and pipes. This phenomenon can occur due to a lack of alignment and collaboration between infrastructure administrators. Consequently, this misalignment leads to nuisance for citizens due to disturbance of the public space and to high costs. In recent years, infrastructure administrators have shown willingness to collaborate on maintenance and renewal projects of the underground infrastructure. However, this barely happens in reality. This raises the following questions: Why are infrastructure administrators not collaborating and how can they collaborate to plan and schedule joint projects?
In the upcoming years, challenges in the renewal and maintenance of the underground infrastructure may emerge due to complexity related to technological innovation (Saidi, Kattan, Jayasinghe, Hettiaratchi, & Taron, 2018), climate change (Bollinger et al., 2014; Chappin & van der Lei, 2014; Saidi et al., 2018) and risk of failure (Saidi et al., 2018). Besides that, minimal disturbance of the public space and a reduction of costs can be achieved when infrastructure administrators collaborate on maintenance and renewal activities of the underground infrastructure (Carey & Lueke, 2013; Halfawy, 2008; Kielhauser, Adey & Lethanh, 2017). Therefore, collaboration on maintenance and renewal activities will become more important (Carey & Lueke, 2013). As such, future research regarding infrastructure systems should focus on collaboration and integration (Carey & Lueke, 2013; Kielhauser et al., 2017; Tscheikner-Gratl, Sitzenfrei, Rauch, & Kleidorfer, 2016). Literature in the field of maintenance and renewal of underground infrastructure is mainly analytical, whereas empirical studies in this field are limited (Saidi et al., 2018). Hence, existing literature lacks an understanding of how infrastructure administrators can use information sharing to plan and schedule joint projects (Halfawy, 2008). In addition, Ouyang (2014) notes that this lack of understanding about the planning and scheduling of maintenance and renewal of the underground infrastructure might be related to confidentiality issues, privacy issues and reservations about sharing information. As these issues obstruct collaboration between the parties, transparency in the available and needed information is minimal (van Riel, Langeveld, Herder, & Clemens, 2014). Therefore, the answer to the question as to how infrastructure administrators can collaborate in the planning and scheduling of maintenance and renewal in underground infrastructure remains unknown. The aim of this research is to give insight in what information would need to be shared by infrastructure administrators to enable planning joint maintenance and renewal projects. This results in the following research question:
5 To provide an answer to the research question, a case study is performed. The following three parties are involved in this research: a water provider, an electricity and gas operator and a municipality. These three parties are selected, because they want to collaborate to plan and schedule joint projects of maintenance and renewal for the underground infrastructure.
This study aims to contribute to the literature by gaining a better understanding on the information that needs to be shared in the planning and scheduling of maintenance and renewal for joint projects related to the underground infrastructure. Hence, for further research these new insights on information sharing between infrastructure administrators, as provided by this study, will help academia to develop techniques and accurate models to support the integration of infrastructure systems. In practice, these new insights can help infrastructure administrators to apply joint maintenance and renewal projects to more projects. Moreover, these joint projects will be beneficial for infrastructure administrators, society and citizens, as it may result in reduced maintenance or renewal costs and a lower amount of infrastructural disturbances.
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2. Theoretical Background
2.1 Maintenance and Renewal of Underground Infrastructure
Maintenance is defined as “a combination of all technical and associated administrative activities required to keep equipment, installations and other physical assets in the desired operating condition or to restore them to this condition” (Muchiri, Pintelon, Gelders, & Martin, 2011, p. 1). Besides maintenance, infrastructure administrators can decide to renew a cable or pipe based on the quality of the cable or pipe (Kleiner, Adams, & Rogers, 2001). Renewal of a cable or pipe implies replacing a cable or pipe by a new one (Kleiner et al., 2001).
Planning maintenance activities entails identifying objects and tasks for maintenance, and making sure that sufficient resources are available to perform the repair actions (Rosqvist, Laakso, & Reunanen, 2009). Planning is often divided into three levels, namely long-term planning (covers a period of two till ten years), medium long planning horizon (covers a period of a year till two or four years) and a short-term planning (covers a period of month till years) (Lidén, 2015). Whereas long-term planning is concerned with the maintenance mission, strategic goals and objectives, medium long planning is concerned with the determination of the maintenance resources that are needed to perform maintenance (Duffuaa, Raouf, & Campbell, 2000; Lidén, 2015). Short-term planning regards detailed plans about equipment, crew and materials related to the daily business activities (Duffuaa et al., 2000; Lidén, 2015).
In order to decide where to do maintenance or renewal activities, a maintenance strategy can be used (Duffuaa et al., 2000). Chughtai and Zayed (2008) argue that from an operational point of view, a maintenance strategy can affect the condition of the underground infrastructure, as a good maintenance strategy can increase the service lives of the underground infrastructure. Four types of maintenance strategies can be distinguished (Schneider et al., 2006). The four types of maintenance strategies are shown in table 1.
TABLE 1 Maintenance strategies Maintenance strategy Explanation
Condition-based Maintenance decisions are based on the information collected through periodically condition monitoring via inspections in order to prevent failure (Schneider et al., 2006).
Reliability centered Cost and reliability of the system are considered in order to prioritize the maintenance activities. The objective is to reduce maintenance cost without reducing safety through preventive maintenance activities (Mirsaeedi, Fereidunian, Mohammadi-Hosseininejad, & Lesani, 2018). Corrective No inspection or preventive maintenance will be performed until a
component breaks down (Schneider et al., 2006).
7 Bertling, Allan, and Eriksson (2005) and Mirsaeedi et al. (2018) note that the reliability centered maintenance strategy is used by infrastructure administrators such as electrical utilities and water companies. Chughtai and Zayed (2008) argue that besides a good maintenance strategy, physical factors may also affect the condition of the underground infrastructure. Physical factors are pipe age, pipe diameter, pipe length, pipe material, pipe depth and pipe gradient (Chughtai & Zayed, 2008; van Dijk & Hendrix, 2016; Kielhauser et al., 2017; Rutsch & Uibrig, 2003). Maintenance or renewal decisions for infrastructure administrators are not only based on a maintenance strategy, but are also influenced by other factors such as political preferences and reputation towards citizens and politicians (van Riel et al., 2014). Moreover, infrastructure administrators must comply to a different set of laws and regulations, which effects the planning and execution of maintenance or renewal activities (Rinaldi, Peerenboom, & Kelly, 2001). Furthermore, it is the role of the municipality to manage the public space (COB, 2009). Accordingly, if an infrastructure administrator wants to do maintenance or renewal in the underground infrastructure, this infrastructure administrator should consult with the municipality to find a tracing (COB, 2009).
According to literature, certain constraints limit the maintenance and renewal planning. Ouyang (2014) mentions that due to budgets, organizations are not able to meet all maintenance needs. Besides budgets, capacity to perform the maintenance activities is required in order to perform any maintenance activity in the requested time horizon (de Boer, Schutten, & Zijm, 1997). Therefore, capacity planning, which consists of the planning of personnel and equipment, is important in planning maintenance projects (Duffuaa et al., 2000). Furthermore, the government can constrain the planning of maintenance and renewal with regulations (Ouyang, 2014).
Due to the given constraints, organizations are not always able to meet all the maintenance and renewal needs. Therefore, prioritizing maintenance and renewal activities is important, which is referred to as “determining the order of execution of maintenance activities which have to be carried out” (Dekker, 1995, p. 226). Often the most urgent work gets the first priority. (Dekker, 1995). Therefore, a preventive maintenance or renewal activity is delayed in favour of a corrective maintenance or renewal activity (Dekker, 1995).
2.2 Joint Projects
8 enact the extent of work, allocating the resources required, planning the execution of the work, monitoring the progress of the work and adapt deviations from the plan (Munns & Bjeirmi, 1996). A project life cycle consists of four stages, namely conceptualization, planning, execution and termination (Adams & Barndt, 1983; Cleland & King, 1983). The conceptualization stage is the initial stage in which is determined if the project is necessary (Cleland & King, 1988). Besides that, the project goals are developed. In the planning stage a planning is made in order to reach the project goals (Cleland & King, 1988). The execution stage exists of the implementation of the project (Cleland & King, 1988). In the termination stage some final activities take place (Cleland & King, 1988). Cooke-Davies (2002) note that a project is successful when it is managed on time, within budget and meets the quality/performance specifications. Project management across organizations is even more complex due to different interests, terminologies, goals, orientations and cultures (Gama, Sjödin, & Frishammar, 2017; Saidi et al., 2018). Joint projects are referred to as “two or more organizational actors from distinct organizations working jointly to create a tangible product/service in a limited period of time” (Jones & Lichtenstein, 2008, p. 234). All parties have their individual projects and need to cooperate and contribute in planning joint projects (Saidi et al., 2018). Supply chain collaboration as a result of joint project planning may result in more efficient business processes (Cassivi, 2006). In a context of maintenance and renewal of the underground infrastructure, cost can be saved, social benefits can be achieved and disturbance of the public space can be reduced by planning joint projects of maintenance and renewal (Carey & Lueke, 2013; Kielhauser et al., 2017). Moreover, Carey and Lueke (2013) argue that if the budget for maintenance and renewal activities is low, the integration of infrastructure systems becomes more important. Hence, planning of joint projects is successful if the participants achieve something together which they cannot achieve independently (Booher, & Innes, 2002; Xue, Shen, & Ren, 2010). In order to collaborate on joint projects, participants need to have a seamless information flow between the parties (Li & Lai, 2005).
2.3 Information Sharing Between Organizations
Information sharing is a phenomenon that occurs on different levels: people share information in groups, departments, organizations or organizations share information with other organizations (Li & Lin, 2006; Mesmer-Magnus & DeChurch, 2009). Hence, information sharing can be defined as “the extent to which critical, often proprietary, information is communicated to one’s partners” (Mohr & Spekman, 1994, p. 139). Kembro and Näslund (2014, p. 181) add the inter-organizational perspective in their definition and define information sharing as “inter-organizational sharing of data, information and/or knowledge in supply chains”.
9 Fratocchi & Rossi Tafuri, 2015). Nevertheless, this study focusses on the strategic and tactical level of information sharing, as information sharing on an operational level consists of short-term quantitative data about daily business activities which does not affect infrastructure administrators’ decisions on whether they want to plan joint projects or not (Zailani, Premkumar, & Fernando, 2008).
Related to this study is the literature on integrated infrastructure systems, which is still limited (Carey & Lueke, 2013; Halfawy, 2008; Kielhauser et al., 2017; Shahata & Zayed, 2010; Tscheikner-Gratl et al., 2016). These papers related to integrated infrastructure systems are quantitative papers focused on developing techniques and mathematical models that support the integration of infrastructure systems. With these models, infrastructure administrators can determine where to start joint maintenance or renewal projects. Carey and Lueke (2013) developed a model to integrate the maintenance planning of roads, sewerage and water components. They based their model on a condition rating and a criticality rating. Kielhauser et al. (2017) also developed a model to integrate maintenance in which they include not only sewerage and water components but also gas and electricity. This model is built on information such as failure probability, age, level of service and budgets.
Yang and Maxwell (2011) argue that information sharing is important in order to increase organizational efficiency and performance. Despite the benefits, organizations can face several issues related to information sharing (Peel & Rowley, 2010). Firms may not agree on what and how much information to share (Yang & Maxwell, 2011). Another issue implies that firms may not share all information, as information sharing can raise concerns of security, privacy and intellectual property (Li, Sikora, Shaw, & Tan, 2006). More importantly, the main issue for infrastructure administrators concerns a lack of available information, comprised of sufficient quality to share with their partners due to the complexity of infrastructure projects (Deng, Li, Tam, Shen, & Love, 2001; Ouyang, 2014; Rouse, 2014). Various academics stress the importance of information quality, as information quality affects the effectiveness of decisions (Petersen, Ragatz, & Monczka, 2005; Rouse, 2014).
2.4 Conceptual Model
10 administrators can influence the individual plans of organizations and how these individual plans can lead to planning joint projects of maintenance and renewal. This entire process will be studied in the context of underground infrastructure. Accordingly, this leads to the following research question: How
can infrastructure administrators plan and schedule joint projects for the underground infrastructure maintenance and renewal?
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3. Methodology
3.1 Research Design
Collaboration between infrastructure administrators in order to plan joint projects in maintenance and renewal of the underground infrastructure is an unexplored topic in literature. Therefore, an in-depth single case study design was applied. A case study approach was chosen due to the following reasons. Firstly, a case study allows for the collection of rich, in-depth information, which fits the exploratory nature of this research (Karlsson, 2016).Secondly, the richness of information as provided by the case study helps to understand how and why certain phenomena exist (Karlsson, 2016). Therefore, a case study can help to answer the ‘how’ research question of this study and to get a better understanding on planning joint project of maintenance and renewal in the underground infrastructure. In this study, a single case study is appropriate because of the complexity and uniqueness of the case (Siggelkow, 2007). The unit of analysis is ‘infrastructure administrators’. This fits this study, as the aim of this study is to investigate what information needs to be shared between infrastructure administrators.
3.2 Research Context
The context of this study is the underground infrastructure of the Netherlands. According to Adl-Zarrabi (2017), the underground infrastructure includes piping networks for supplying water, heat and natural gas, electrical and communication cables and tunnels. In this study, the focus is on the existing network of pipes and cables of water supply, gas and electricity and sewerages. As such, the tunnel and communication network is outside the scope of this study. A continuous and reliable functioning of the underground infrastructure is of great importance for the economy of a country and the well-being of citizens (Ouyang, 2014). Furthermore, the underground infrastructure in the Netherlands is not completely owned by the government. The sewerage is state owned, because the municipality is a governmental body (COB, 2009). The water provider and the electricity and gas operator are non-profit organizations, so the piping networks for supplying water, the electricity cables and the gas pipes are not state owned (COB, 2009).
3.3 Case Selection
12 in Groningen have stated in their coalition agreement of 2014 that they want to work together. As such, the involved parties already collaborate in the project “lead together” (in Dutch: “samen aan de leiding”), which shows a proactive attitude towards this agreement. In this project, the infrastructure administrators are performing a pilot in planning and scheduling a joint project of maintenance and renewal with one contractor. Moreover, the electricity and gas operator, one of the participating parties, has to deal with the replacement of toxic gray cast iron before 2024. These three characteristics make this a unique case that fits the aim of this research. The three infrastructure administrators that are part of this case are described in table 2 below.
TABLE 2
General Company Description Water
provider
Electricity and gas operator Municipality Description of activities Supply clean and pure drinking water for the lowest possible price.
The installation of the energy and gas network and the management, maintenance and development of the energy and gas network.
Related to the underground infrastructure the municipality is responsible for the installation, maintenance and renewal of
sewerages and street lighting. Besides the municipality is responsible for the public space, roads and gives
permission to dig.
3.4 Data Collection
The primary source of data in this study was gathered in nine semi-structured interviews. These interviews have been held with the employees responsible for the planning of the maintenance and renewal activities for all of the three companies. Employees on the different levels of the organization were interviewed, both on strategic and tactical level. An overview of the interviews is shown in table 3. Interview one was conducted with two interviewees at once due to their busy time schedules. Based on the literature, an interview protocol was made in order to cover all the important topics and structure the interview questions. All interviews started with a general question “can you tell me more about your
role in this organization related to the underground infrastructure?” This question was asked in order
to provide context and to put the interviewee at ease. Subsequently, in-depth questions were asked related to the following topics long-term planning, short-term planning, information sharing, joint projects and budgeting in order to get a deeper understanding of how joint projects are identified and what kind of information is needed to share in order to plan and schedule joint projects. For example
“what kind of information do you need from another infrastructure administrator in order to improve your planning?” Not every topic was asked to every interviewee. In the fourth column of table 3 is stated
which topic was discussed with a specific interviewee. The interview closes with questions such as “are
there documents available which I can use for my research related to the topics of my research?” With
13 important and the interviewer was able to gather important company documents which were useful as input for the research. A complete overview of the interview questions is shown in appendix A. Importantly, the semi-structured nature of the interviews provides the interviewer with the opportunity to ask additional questions which emerge during the interview (Blumberg, Cooper & Schindler, 2014). The interview protocol (appendix A) and the consent form (appendix B) were sent to the interviewees prior to the interview. At the beginning of the interview the anonymity of the interviewee was guaranteed. All interviews have been performed face-to-face. The interviews have been conducted in Dutch to avoid language barriers. The interview questions were improved after each interview. After completion, the interviews have been transcribed word by word. For verification, these interview transcripts have been shared with the interviewees.
TABLE 3 Overview of interviews Interviewee Company Position
interviewee
Interview topic Duration
A1 Water
provider
Asset manager Long-term planning, information sharing, joint planning Budgeting 1:10:32 A2 Water provider Asset manager A3 Water provider Project manager Long-term planning, information sharing, joint planning 44:37 A4 Water provider Planner and supervisor of projects Short-term planning, information sharing, joint planning 38:15 B1 Electricity and gas operator Environment manager on a strategic level Long-term planning, information sharing, joint planning, budgeting 1:05:25 B2 Electricity and gas operator Senior engineer Short-term planning, information sharing, joint planning 36:14 B3 Electricity and gas operator Work Force Management Short-term planning, information sharing, joint planning
42:51
C1 Municipality Planner urban management
Long-term planning, short-term planning, information sharing, joint planning, budgeting
59:14
C2 Municipality Project manager city engineers
Long-term planning, short-term planning, information sharing, joint planning
50:53
C3 Municipality Project manager city engineers
Long-term planning, short-term planning, information sharing, joint planning
14 In order to support the primary data, secondary data will be used in this study. The secondary data includes annual reports and policy documents of the involved organizations and available documents from third parties such as Centrum Ondergronds Bouwen and Next Generation Infrastructures. The annual reports and documents from third parties were used to get an understanding of the research topic and the involved stakeholders. The policy documents were used to get a better understanding of the organizations maintenance and renewal procedures and project cycles.
3.5 Data Analysis
After data collection, the data was structured with codes in order to find patterns in the data. The coding was performed in the program Atlas.it. The first step in the coding process concerned coding the transcripts with first-order codes. The first-order codes are in-vivo codes in order to stay close to the information as expressed by the interviewees. For example “ yes and of course politics. The politic have
their own programs. At the moment we have a new board of municipality which determine new developments and movements for the upcoming four years which have an influence on our work field”
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TABLE 4
Example coding tree maintenance renewal of underground infrastructure
Quotes First order concepts Second order themes
"It is possible that there is not enough capacity
for the sewerage if another neighbourhood is connected to the sewerage" (C1)
"Is there enough supply capacity, if not, than
there will be expansion projects. It is to increase the grid, because of the increase in water consumption." (A2)
Capacity
Reason for individual maintenance
“The quality and lifespan of a sewerage” (C3) “If we had a lot of malfunction asset management
can decide to renew a pipe” (A4)
Quality “It is not raining more, but it is raining harder”
(C3) Climate change
“Of course politics has his programs. Every
program has new developments and movements for the upcoming three till four years which delivers us work.” (C2)
“At the municipality we work in a politically
driven environment” (C3)
Political influences
“We have to deal with societal developments, for
example population growth” (A3)
“Because of the sustainability issue, the whole
energy management of houses goes upside down. No longer natural gas, but 100% electric” (B1)
Societal developments “We look forward for four years” (C1)
“In our investment program we look five years
forward, but the most interesting is the next year”
(A1)
Long-term
Planning horizon “For me a short-term planning is approximately
one year” (A4)
“On a short-term we look forward for half a year
till a year.” (C3)
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4. Findings
First of all, the way individual infrastructure administrators plan maintenance and renewal of
underground infrastructure is presented. Secondly, regarding joint projects, the factors that influence the collaboration decision are elaborated on. Finally, the results show which information needs to be shared in order to plan joint projects of maintenance and renewal of underground infrastructure and what issues related to information sharing occur.
4.1 Maintenance and Renewal of Underground Infrastructure
All infrastructure administrators have an individual maintenance and renewal planning. When making this individual maintenance and renewal planning infrastructure administrators have their own factors and policies that influence the decision on where to do maintenance or renewal activities. Table 5 shows the similarities and differences of maintenance and renewal of the underground infrastructure between the three organizations. Consequently, the findings as displayed in the table are laid out per organization.
TABLE 5
Similarities and differences of maintenance and renewal of underground infrastructure Similarities
▪ Based their individual maintenance or renewal activities on quality, capacity, climate change, politics and social developments
▪ Short-term planning horizon is a half till 1 year
▪ Prioritize maintenance or renewal activities on a risk analysis
Water provider
▪ Quality based on expert judgement ▪ Long-term planning
horizon 5 years ▪ Constraints are budget
and external factors ▪ Prevent image damage
Electricity and gas operator
▪ Quality based on a test ▪ Long-term planning horizon 3-4 years ▪ Constraints are contractors and external factors ▪ Energy transition Municipality
▪ Quality based on a test ▪ Long-term planning
horizon 4 years (sewerage) and 1 year (street lightning) ▪ Constraints are politics
and budget ▪ Prioritize based on possibility to combine own maintenance or renewal activities. Water provider
17 maintenance or renewal, there is unplanned renewal, this is when there is malfunction or when there are water quality complaints.
There is a 5 year investment program. Investments are divided evenly per year. The water network is laid out in the 60s-70s, and the water provider wants to spread the renewal of these pipes to prevent a peak. Besides this they have a water supply plan for the upcoming 25 years, in this plan they think about new water collection areas and the supply of the water from this water collection area to the places of usage. Planning for the short-term is one year ahead.
The water provider finds it important to do maintenance and renewal in a socially responsible way in order to prevent from image damage. By which they mean according to a socially responsible price and with minimal nuisance for citizens. The main constraint in the individual maintenance and renewal planning of the water provider is the budget. The budget is dependent on the development of water prices, in which the water provider has as a policy that the water prices have to stay low. Moreover, shareholders of the water provider are politician of municipalities and the province. Therefore, the planning for maintenance and renewal activities of the water provider is influenced by politics. Besides that, they find it important to collaborate with other infrastructure administrators when possible in order to reduce disturbance of the public space. For the water provider the availability of contractors is not a constraint, but they see that the prices of contractors rise which constraints the planning. Besides that, external factors such as stakeholders influences can constraint the planning. For example ‘Groningen Bereikbaar’ can constraint the planning, because the water provider cannot break open a street which limits the accessibility of the city.
The water provider prioritizes work based on a risk analysis and the failure rate. The location of the pipe could influence the risk number, for example if a pipe has a high risk to failure next to provincial road dispute road safety.
Electricity and gas operator
The electricity and gas operator determine maintenance and renewal activities based on a risk assessment. The life course and economic depreciation is not included. Besides that, unpredictable pipe failures influence the maintenance and renewal planning. Moreover, the maintenance and renewal planning is influenced by politics, as the State Supervision of the Mines (in Dutch: Staatstoezicht op de Mijnen) imposed that all pipes with gray cast iron need to be replaced before the 1st of January 2024,
18 want to have solar panels on their roofs. These movements towards more sustainable energy causes a high burden on the electricity grid. At the moment the electricity and gas operator has not enough capacity to connect all the solar panels to the grid. Besides that, the energy consumption increases. These changes in energy use leads to capacity expansion of the electricity grid.
On a long-term, the electricity and gas operator looks three till four years ahead. On a short-term they look a half till one year ahead.
The availability of contractors constraints the maintenance and renewal planning for the electricity and gas operator. This is caused by the demand which is greater than the supply of contractors. Moreover, external factors constraint the maintenance and renewal planning, such as the result of soil testing, applying for permits, archaeological research and monumental trees.
The electricity and gas operator has a list of priorities. They first renew the cables and pipes which have the highest safety risk, such as the malfunctions and the replacement of gray cast iron. Then they will do the customer driven activities, such as a solar parc or house connection to the grid. Thirdly is an improvement or an expansion for a customer. And the last priority is the acceleration of the energy transition.
Municipality
There are five reasons why the municipality plans to do individual maintenance or renewal. The first reason for the municipality to do maintenance or renewal is because of political plans. Every four years there is a new city council, which may emphasize other developments and movements. Secondly, quality is an important reason to do maintenance. This can sometimes been based on age which is determined based on previous experience or could be based on a quality test. Another reason is climate change, as it can trigger the planning of maintenance and renewal activities, due to heavy rainfall. Furthermore, capacity expansion is a reason to do maintenance or renewal activities, if for example another neighbourhood is connected to the sewerage it is important to look if the sewerage have enough capacity to process the waste water. Finally, societal developments have an influence on the planning, for example more people go by bike to work causing the importance of good cycle paths.
The planning horizon for the municipality is four years for sewerage. For public street lightning the municipality looks forward for one year. There is no long-term plan for projects. For the municipality the short-term consist a half till one year. On the short-term the maintenance and renewal plans are made more concrete.
19 The municipality prioritizes work based on urgency. They have a point system from 1 till 5. If a sewerage gets a 5 it is good, there will be no need for maintenance or renewal. When it scores an 1 it is very bad and is in need of maintenance or renewal. The location of the sewerage influences the risk number. It depends on how many people suffer from it. The municipality prioritizes to combine own maintenance or renewal activities. If there is a place where they can combine sewerage activities with a new road, this gets a priority.
4.2 Joint Projects
Planning joint projects is a complex process, because of the individual differences. If one of the infrastructure administrators is indicating an area in which they want to do some maintenance and renewal activities, then the other infrastructure administrators have to make a decision if they want to join this project or not. In this paper this is called the collaboration decision. This collaboration decision can be influenced by different factors. Below the different factors that influence the collaboration decision are highlighted for each organization. Besides that, the problems that rise from these differences are elaborated on.
Water provider
The first consideration for collaboration on a project, is to look if there is an individual need to do maintenance or renewal at the designated area. The second step in this collaboration decision is to look if there is enough budget available to do the project. Besides that, they look if there is a contractor available who can do the maintenance or renewal activity against a socially responsible price. “Yes it
did not happen often that we did not have a successful tender…, but we perceive that the prices of the contractor rise. This is sometimes a reason that we postpone a maintenance or renewal activity, because it is social money that we spend.” (A4). Figure 2 shows the collaboration decision steps for the water
provider.
FIGURE 2
Steps in the collaboration decision of water provider
Second step:
Is there enough budget available to do maintenance or renewal? Is there a contractor available that can do the maintenance or renewal against a social responsible price?
First step:
20
Electricity and gas operator
The first step in the collaboration decision for the electricity and gas operator is to look if there is an individual need for maintenance or renewal activities. If the electricity and gas operator has a pipe of gray cast iron at the designated area then they will always join the collaboration, because the removal of gray cast iron has a high priority for the electricity and gas operator. If the cable or pipe has another type of material the electricity and gas operator only join the collaboration if the risk to failure of that cable or pipe is high. “The type of material is a factor that influences the collaboration decision. Is it
gray cast iron, than we join the project, but is it another type of material, than we will think carefully if we want to join on that project.” (B3) The electricity and gas operator mentioned that for other
infrastructure administrators the budget is an indicator if they want to collaborate, but for the electricity and gas operator the budget is not a factor that influences the collaboration decision. For the electricity and gas operator, the availability of contractors is an issue which can influence the collaboration decision. Therefore, the second step in the collaboration decision is to look if there is a contractor available who can do the maintenance or renewal activity. “Capacity, work capacity that becomes more
and more an issue. We never expected it, but it is an issue. It is because of the aging of cables and pipes and the increase of the energy transition which causes us to use our capacity differently.” (B1) Besides
that, the electricity and gas operator mentioned that it is sometimes mandatory to collaborate with the water provider because their pipes are literally tied together. Figure 3 shows the collaboration decision steps for the electricity and gas operator.
FIGURE 3
Steps in the collaboration decision electricity and gas operator
Municipality
The first step in the collaboration decision for the municipality is also to look if there is an individual need for maintenance and renewal activities. The second step in the collaboration decision is to look if there is budget available to do the maintenance or renewal activity. “We look if we have enough money
available, finances always play a role.” (C3). Finally, the municipality states that other infrastructure
administrators sometimes cannot collaborate because they do not have a contractor or cannot agree on a price with the contractor. For the municipality itself the availability of contractors is not a problem. “Maintenance and renewal activities can be performed at the moment we planned it. I understand that
Second step:
Is there a contractor available to do the
maintenance or renewal? Is it mandatory to do a joint project?
First step:
21
this is differently at the utility parties. There the demand is bigger than the supply of workers.” (C1)
Figure 4 shows the collaboration decision steps for the municipality.
FIGURE 4
Steps in the collaboration decision municipality
Problems
A problem in planning joint projects of maintenance and renewal is that infrastructure administrators are mainly focused on their own maintenance and renewal activities. “At the moment everyone mainly
goes for their own pile and there is little synergy in it.” (C2) Besides that, the difference between
infrastructure administrators in the individual maintenance and renewal and in the collaboration decision can sometimes lead to conflicts and thresholds in the collaboration, if the infrastructure administrators are not aware of these differences and if they do not take into account these differences. “So together
searching for a solution is important. It often happen that the solution found is not in harmony with the interest of other organizations. Which lead to anger and that you do not want to talk to each other anymore.” (C1) In order to illustrate this, an example will be given. The electricity and gas operator has
a big task in there underground network related to gray cast iron, for which they do not think that it is possible to finish this with tenders. Therefore, they selected six contractors to do those gray cast iron projects. But in this case the electricity and gas operator does not take into account what would be the effect of these solo contracts on the collaboration decision for other parties. With as a result that if the water provider wants to collaborate in the same area, the price of the contractor is often too high for the water provider. The reason for this is that the water provider is mandatory to place a tender if the costs of a project are above a certain level, because they believe that with a tender the maintenance or renewal costs will decrease. Therefore, they will not be able to collaborate on such projects because they think it is not a socially responsible price. So the solo contracts of the electricity and gas operator sometimes lead to individual projects instead of joint projects. “The electricity and gas operator wants that we make
price agreements with their solo contractor, but our purchase condition does not allow that.” (A4) “So the solo contracts give tension and discussion points between parties.” (A4)
4.3 Information Sharing Between Organizations
Sharing the right information can cause more synergy between infrastructure administrators and less conflicts. So, first the information that infrastructure administrators share now will be given. Secondly, information that infrastructure administrators want to share on a strategic level will be given, followed
Second step:
Is there enough budget available to do maintenance or renewal?
First step:
22 by the information on a tactical level. Besides that, barriers in information sharing will be given. Table 6 shows what the infrastructure administrators are sharing now and what they think they want to share.
TABLE 6
Strategic and tactical information sharing What infrastructure administrators share now
Strategic Maintenance and renewal plans for the upcoming 2 years Tactical Design
Time schedule
At the moment infrastructure administrators share maintenance and renewal plans for the upcoming 2 years on a strategic level in a strategic consultation. “We try to look at the longer term. At least to the
upcoming 2 years.” (C1) On a tactical level they share a design and a time schedule. “We share our design, so we could align the designs.” (B2)
Water provider
On a strategic level the water provider wants to share long-term plans with a planning horizon of five years. “No, if I know that another party is also doing maintenance or renewal activities in that
neighbourhood or street, than I know enough.” (A1) “We need to know the plans of the other infrastructure administrators for the upcoming five years.” (A3)
On a tactical level the water provider wants to know more detailed plans. This detailed plans consist of a definitive design and a definitive time schedule. “it would be nice if we get a design with a hard start
date and that we have enough time to reach the goal.” (A4) At the moment they share a design and a
time schedule, but a lot of changes are made in the design and time scheduling during the planning
What infrastructure administrators want to share
Water provider Strategic Maintenance and renewal plans for the upcoming 5 years Tactical Definitive design
Definitive time schedule Delays
If the other parties have a contractor available Definitive agreement on collaboration
Electricity and gas operator Strategic Multi-year plan Developments Bottlenecks Tactical Definitive design
Definitive time schedule Delays
If the other parties have enough budget available
Municipality Strategic Maintenance and renewal plans for the upcoming 5 years Developments
Bottlenecks Tactical Definitive design
Definitive agreement on collaboration
23 process which bring frustration. For the water provider it is important to timely know if there are shifts in projects, so it is important to share the status of a project each month. Besides that, the water provider wants to know if the other party has found a contractor to execute the project. “It is more about the
executive staff if there is enough capacity for it.” (A4) The water provider wants a definitive agreement
on the collaboration. “I want to know if the other parties join the project or not” (A3)
Electricity and gas operator
On a strategic level the electricity and gas operator wants to share the multi-year plans of the involved parties. This multi-year plan consists of the areas in which the infrastructure administrator wants to do maintenance and renewal activities. Sharing both small and large projects is important. Consequently, sharing activities which are not related to the underground infrastructure could be of value, such as road renewal plans. “Although you are not dependent on each other or have common ground. If the
municipality is going to renew all the streets it is handy that utility parties do their renewals first.” (B2)
Moreover, the electricity and gas operator wants to share long-term developments such as the energy transition. “Perhaps the municipality choose to install a heating system in certain neighbourhoods. That
has consequences for our grid in the longer term…” (B2) Lastly, they want to share bottlenecks the
organization is facing on a strategic level. “We need to share our bottlenecks and include the other
parties in the development process on how to solve the problem.” (B3)
On a tactical level, the electricity and gas operator needs to know the design from the other infrastructure administrators with detailed information about what needs to be done. Besides that, a definitive time schedule is necessary, in which delays will be timely communicated. The electricity and gas operator wants to know if the other parties have enough budget available to do the job.
Municipality
On a strategic level, the municipality wants to share information about developments for the upcoming 10 till 15 years. These developments are not concrete, but useful to share with other infrastructure administrators because it can have an influence on the long-term planning of infrastructure administrators. “I think that we could share much earlier that there are certain developments. Even if it
is only that they know it coming.” (C2) Besides developments, they want to know information about the
initiatives or the upcoming maintenance and renewal activities for the next five years. In which areas do you want to do some maintenance and renewal activities and when and which projects have priority. “I
want to know the plans for the upcoming five years. If we know that from each other, then we can make shifts in the planning and find joint projects.” (C1) Moreover, the municipality wants to share
information about the bottlenecks of the organizations. “Well, it is sometimes easy to know what issues
24 On a tactical level the municipality wants to know the plans of other infrastructure administrators. They want to see a definitive design. Furthermore, they want to have a definitive agreement on the collaboration. “We need a definitive agreement on the collaboration” (C3) They want to know if everyone have enough resources available to do the job, such as money and contractors. “We have the
money for it on the shelf and we have a contractor available to do the job” (C3)
Information sharing issues
One issue the infrastructure administrators face related to information sharing is that the information is not always available. Because of the influence of the politics, it is hard for the municipality to know what maintenance and renewal activities there are for the upcoming years. Also the other infrastructure administrators do not always know exactly their individual plans. Which can cause last-minute changes. “We have a renewal planning for the upcoming 3 or 4 years, because we do not exactly know what we
will happen next.” (B1) Secondly, the infrastructure administrators do not want to share all information
related to maintenance and renewal of the underground infrastructure, because they do not want to lose their negotiation position. All the infrastructure administrators do not want to share budgets with each other. “They do not need to know financially” (A4) In addition, the electricity and gas operator does not want to share customer information related to maintenance and renewal activities. Besides that, they do not want to share the condition of the cables and pipes. The reason for not sharing is that they want to keep control over their own maintenance and renewal planning. “We want to share the location of our
pipes, but we do not want to share what kind of material it is or the age of the pipe. Because we do not
want other parties to impose what we need to do.” (B1)Finally, an issue in information sharing is that
the information that is shared is not always complete. For example not all infrastructure administrators share small projects. “The water provider does not always share his own renewals on time, because they
think it are small projects which will not influence the planning. But they need to share small project
25
5. Discussion
Carey and Lueke (2013) and Kielhauser et al. (2017) described that saving costs is one of the benefits of joint project planning. However, the findings of this study show that this is not always true, as planning joint projects is more complex than planning individual projects. This complexity increases due to the differences in the organizations. Planning joint projects leads to more consultation and adjustment between organizations, which is time consuming and expensive. Besides that, in joint project planning organizations become dependent on each other. If one of the organizations’ planning is delayed due to external factors such as a permit application or results of a soil investigation, the whole joint project is delayed. This delay of one organization can cause frustration for the other organizations. Specifically, high costs of a joint project can constraint infrastructure administrators to collaborate, because of misalignment in budgets. In this study, this is mainly caused by solo contracts, which lead to high project costs. This causes one of the other participants to prefer to do his activity individually in five years. Consequently, more disturbance of the public space may be the result. This finding is contrary to a previous study of Carey and Lueke (2013). This paper suggests that if the budget is low, the integration of infrastructure systems becomes more important. This contradiction may be related to a low budget of one party and a high budget of one of the other parties.
Ouyang (2014) and de Boer et al. (1997) argued that a budget and the availability of contractors can constraint the maintenance and renewal planning, which is equal to the findings of this study. An interesting finding of this study related to the constraints implies showing that the interaction between these differences in constraints have an influence on the collaboration decision. As the findings show that the budget constraint of the water provider conflicts with the contractor constraint of the electricity and gas operator, which causes less joint projects. Therefore, it can be suggested that infrastructure administrators need to share their individual policies and ways of working with each other and be aware of these differences when making decisions related to maintenance and renewal of the underground infrastructure in order to plan more joint projects. Furthermore, these differences also have an influence on the information needed to be shared, because this study shows that if a budget constraints the planning of one infrastructure administrator the other infrastructure administrators want to know if he has enough budget to execute the joint project.
27
6. Conclusion
This study explores how infrastructure administrators can plan and schedule joint projects of maintenance and renewal of the underground infrastructure. The aim of this study is to give insight in what information is needed to be shared for planning joint maintenance and renewal projects. Hence, the following research question is answered: How can infrastructure administrators plan and schedule
joint projects for the underground infrastructure maintenance and renewal?
As a theoretical contribution, this paper provides insights into the factors that influence the collaboration decision. The findings show that the main factors are availability of contractors, availability of budget and the individual need of maintenance or renewal activities. Furthermore, this study gives insight in what information needs to be shared on a strategic and a tactical level in order to better plan joint projects of maintenance and renewal activities of the underground infrastructure. On a strategic level, infrastructure administrators need to share a multi-year plan for the upcoming five years, developments and bottlenecks. On a tactical level, infrastructure administrators need to share a design, time schedule, delays, definitive agreements on collaboration and availability of resources. Besides that, this study gives insight in the issues related to information sharing, namely availability, what not to share and completeness. As this study indicates, infrastructure administrators do not want to share budgets and detailed information about their cables and pipes. Therefore, existing integrated infrastructure models are not fitting with practice. These new insights from this paper can help academia built better integrated infrastructure models that fits with practice.
6.1 Managerial Implications
28 level they need to share developments and bottlenecks. On a tactical level, infrastructure administrators need to share a definitive design, definitive time schedule, delays, definitive agreements on collaboration and availability of resources. Sharing the right information can lead to more joint projects and a more efficient collaboration, because it will prevent conflicts and irritations among organizations.
6.2 Limitations and Recommendations for Future Research
29
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8. Appendix
A. Interview Protocol About the researcher
Marlieke Zaal is a student Supply Chain Management at the university of Groningen. At the moment she is writing her master thesis about how infrastructure administrators can plan joint projects related to the maintenance and renewal of the underground infrastructure. This research is part of a larger research about how infrastructure administrators can improve the collaboration on joint maintenance activities. Prof. Dr. D. P. van Donk who is involved in this larger project is my supervisor. The deadline for the thesis is on 24 June 2019.
Context and purpose of the research
This research is about how infrastructure administrators can plan joint projects of maintenance and renewal of the underground infrastructure. The focus will be on the maintenance and renewal of existing cables and pipes in the underground. In this research the following companies will be involved Waterbedrijf Groningen, Enexis and Gemeente Groningen. Underground infrastructure will be referred to as the cables and pipes regarding water supply, electricity, gas and sewages. Besides the focus of this research will be on which information needs to be shared between infrastructure
administrators in order to plan joint projects of maintenance and renewal of the underground infrastructure. Planning joint projects will lead to cost savings, less disturbance and less excavation damage. In addition early coordination of maintenance plans will promote digging rest. The aim of the research is to gain insight into what information needs to be shared between infrastructure
administrators in order to plan joint projects of maintenance and renewal of the underground infrastructure.
Interview procedure
To guarantee anonymity and confidentiality, the interviewee is asked for approval by signing the consent form. Before the interview is conducted, the interviewee is informed of the interview topics and questions. This can be found on page 2 of this document. The interview will be recorded with your permission. The recording will only be used by the researcher. A transcript of the interview will be sent to you within a week to prevent any misunderstanding. The interviewee is not obliged to answer the questions and may withdraw during the interview. It is permitted for the interviewee to ask questions about the research before, during and after the interview.
If you have any questions about the interview in advance, you can contact the researcher at the mail address or telephone number below.
Marlieke Zaal
m.zaal@student.rug.nl +31625454589
Supervisor:
Professor Dr. Van Donk
