Quote:
I know the ability to "earmark" money is challenging in our political environment ..but if a bridge has a 25 year lifespan ..you had better be planning on raising money for 25 years to replace it.
Problem is that infrastructure, once it's reached the end of it's depreciation life is worth the most to those who own it.
I'll use some big money generating facility as an example.
They are designed (typically) for 25 years, 150,000 operating hours. They are depreciated over 25 years.
When the 25 years is up, then the station is essentially "free" and generation from there on is cream. This is the point that returns to shareholders really crank up.
Then the "life management" issue comes up.
Components don't all fail at the 25 year mark (like Colin Chapman's ideal race car), some things are only half stuffed.
So you survey to identify damage and risk, and start remedial works to manage the ultimate life of the equipment. Have to financially evaluate even equipment that is totally rooted, as no-one wants to spend new capital on an asset that's beyond it's use by date (even though they are making a lot of money using it).
As reports pass up the chain, they go from "serious", to "concerning", to "manageable", to "well managed" to "no problem".
That way, those managers in the middle don't suffer too much heat, and those up top have plausible deniability.
There's absolutely nothing wrong in my eyes of managing the residual life of an asset to the most economic point for replacement, as long as all things are factored into the assessment.
I've been chipped a few times for some of my cost benefit analyses, as when assessing risk/consequence, if there's a possible serious injury/fatality associated with a risk, I insert the biggest financial number that the programme will accept as the consequence...I won't value a human life, so they get the biggest cost possible.
