Copperleaf Holds 2nd Annual German AIPM Forum

Copperleaf™ held its 2nd annual Asset Investment Planning & Management (AIPM) Forum in cooperation with Capgemini Invent, Meliorate, and the Canadian Trade Commissioner Service, on November 19th at the Canadian Embassy in Berlin. Asset management thought leaders from various German DSOs, TSOs, generation companies, and universities participated in a packed day of sessions focused on “Mastering the Challenges of the Energy Transition”.

Mr. Phillipp Rantzsch from 50Hertz Transmission GmbH shared his valuable insights into investment planning and portfolio management and why his organization selected C55™ as the solution to revolutionize its AIPM processes. 50Hertz manages the transmission grid for northern and eastern Germany, ensuring electricity supply to over 18 million people. Working actively on managing the energy transition, 50Hertz is a forward-thinking operator that prides itself on “realising the grid of the future” and recognizes the value of improving the management of its investments through their full lifecycle and developing comprehensive risk-based asset management plans.

Mr. Jan Patrick Linossier, Head of Network Strategy at Rheinische NETZGesellschaft (RNG) spoke about “Asset Investment Planning and Management at a Multi-Utility”. RNG manages and operates over 30,000 km of distribution networks for electricity, gas, water, and district heating for the city of Cologne and surrounding region of Germany. Having gone live with its C55 implementation earlier this year, RNG is experiencing improved transparency about risks and investments, a streamlined approach to planning, and better control over limited resources. “The implementation of an AIPM solution is one of the key building blocks to further solidify the foundation of ISO 55000-aligned asset management at RNG. With C55, we can achieve the required transparency and consistency for decision making in accordance with these standards,” said Mr. Linossier.

The forum also provided an opportunity for attendees to engage with the growing DACH (Germany, Austria, Switzerland) region team at Copperleaf. In one of the sessions, Copperleaf Solutions Consultant, Dr. Thorsten Stechert, provided an overview of the C55 Decision Analytics solution and highlighted a number of new innovations that will empower utilities to make even smarter investment decisions with an eye on the future. Some of the topics included:

• Asset Simulation:
  • Understanding the risk profile associated with your asset portfolio and how this will change over time
  • Identifying the most critical assets
  • Identifying the best possible set of interventions for individual assets and groups of assets with respect to various constraints
• Portfolio Optimization:
  • How to direct available funding and resources to the investments that deliver the most value to your business
  • Identifying which projects to defer when there are funding or cash flow constraints
  • How to simplify investment capture

Attendees appreciated the opportunity to interact in dynamic panel discussions led by Dr. Joerg Katzfey from Capgemini Invent and Mr. Lars Overdiek from Meliorate. Topics that resonated with the delegates included asset management best practices, examples of implementation approaches, and business cases for effective AIPM practices in the energy sector.

The German AIPM Forum was a great success with interesting discussions on the trends impacting asset management in the energy sector. We look forward to next year’s forum to continue the discussions!

If you are interested in participating in our next Copperleaf forum, or would like to speak with one of our product experts, please reach out to us.