ASSET MANAGEMENT RESOURCES

• Q&A: Inside A Municipal Water Deal That Didn't Happen — And Why That Matters

  After initially voting for it, the Rahway (NJ) Municipal Council reversed course and canceled its bid process for the potential sale of the city’s water utility. As more municipalities explore alternative ownership, financing, or partnership models to address aging water infrastructure, Rahway’s experience offers a useful case study in how quickly these processes can shift — and why — explored in this Q&A with Obermayer’s Tom Wyatt.

• Critical Infrastructure Fails The Way It's Funded

  Our infrastructure systems have operated in managed deterioration for decades. And not surprisingly, once they deteriorate badly enough and cross over into active failure, all cost discipline disappears.
• Geotechnical IoT Shifts Water Infrastructure From Reactive To Predictive

  Currently, water infrastructure is outdated and fragile, prone to breakages and leaks. Reactive approaches to water infrastructure are only implemented after an incident and are more expensive than simple maintenance fixes. Geotechnical Internet of Things (IoT) devices enable water and wastewater industry professionals to identify and address issues before they escalate into catastrophic events.
• Designing Wastewater Projects That Align With Multi-Year Capital Improvement Plans

  Successful wastewater infrastructure requires aligning engineering decisions with long-term capital improvement cycles. By prioritizing phased adaptability and modular design, utilities can manage staged funding effectively while ensuring systems remain scalable for future regulatory and growth demands.

• What Small Municipal Utilities Get Wrong About 'Right-Sizing' Treatment Plants

  Traditional wastewater plant design often relies on outdated flow assumptions, leading to oversized, inefficient systems. Prioritizing actual usage data and modular scalability ensures operational stability and fiscal responsibility, protecting small communities from the long-term burdens of overbuilt infrastructure.

• Cybersecurity Best Practices For Private Utilities

  Digital connectivity in decentralized water systems creates new vulnerabilities for private utilities. Protecting critical infrastructure requires proactive "cyber hygiene," including network segmentation and rigorous access controls, to ensure operational uptime and prevent unauthorized system interference.

• Solving Cavitation Challenges: Understanding Low NPSH Pump Design In Modern Systems

  Understanding how low Net Positive Suction Head (NPSH) pump designs work, and why they matter, requires stepping back from component-level thinking to look at how pumps interact with the supply systems.
• AI Agents In Your Water Utility: A Powerful Co-Pilot Or A Risky Takeover?

  AI agents serve as powerful co-pilots for water utilities, enhancing data analysis and predictive maintenance. By maintaining human oversight, these tools empower operators to optimize network performance and improve resource management through intuitive, data-driven insights.

• Study Reveals A Comprehensive Guide To IoT Integration For Non-Revenue Water Management

  A recent study argues that the traditional, manual approach to drinking-water distribution-network monitoring and leak prevention is no longer sustainable. Instead, utilities must embrace the Internet of Things (IoT) to transition from reactive repairs to proactive asset management.
• Tackling The Trillion-Gallon Problem: Water Loss Reduction Initiatives Benefit Utilities And Consumers Alike

  In the U.S. alone, 2.7 trillion gallons of water are lost to non-revenue water (NRW) every year, costing water utilities more than $6.4 billion annually in unrealized revenue. Given the scale of the issue — volumes and dollars — NRW presents an opportunity for upscaling utility management.