New Zealand Asset Management Symposium – Delivering Value through Innovation

• Date: 14 August 2025
• Time: 9am – 5pm
• Location: Auckland University of Technology Conference Centre
• Theme: Delivering Value through Innovation
• Cost: $250 Members | $395 Non-members (Australian Dollars)

Keynote Speaker: Andy Hagan (New Zealand Infrastructure Commission) – From Plans to Performance – Putting the NIP’s ‘Start-with-Maintenance’ Agenda to Work

Panel Session: Lifting NZ Productivity through innovative Infrastructure Management

Other speakers:

• Toby Horstead (AMCouncil) – AMCouncil updates, activities and innovation
• Kevin Stevens and Cijina Lazo-Ron (Transpower) – Advanced corrosion modelling for lifetime extension of overhead power transmission lines
• Myles Lind and Cam Gordon (Auckland Transport) – Innovating back to the future
• Bevan Assink (KiwiRail) – City Rail Link – The Rail Assets journey from requirements through to entering service
• Andy Lyon (KiwiRail) – Embedding innovation and providing enduring value through major infrastructure programmes
• Andrew Gatland (Asset Dynamics) – Sweating the data assets
• Maurice Hoban (GHD) – Smart Seeds: Empowering Emerging Leaders Through Innovation

Scroll down for topic summaries and speaker information:

Keynote: From Plans to Performance – Putting the NIP’s ‘Start-with-Maintenance’ Agenda to Work

New Zealand spends more on infrastructure than most OECD nations yet ranks near the bottom for “bang-for-buck” – a gap driven by weak asset-management practice and chronic under-funding of renewals.

The Draft National Infrastructure Plan (NIP) flips the script with a “Start-with-Maintenance” mandate, legislating 10-year AM-investment plans, transparent performance reporting and independent assurance for central-government agencies. Andy Hagan will set out:

• Why lifting AM maturity is the fastest path to productivity gains – and how New Zealand currently ranks fourth-to-last in the OECD.
• The NIP’s three practical levers for closing the gap – planning, funding stability and assurance.
• What all this means for asset owners, AM practitioners and the 40 % of the infrastructure workforce already dedicated to operations and maintenance.

Delegates will leave with a clear view of where the NIP lands, what will change in their day-to-day practice, and where their expertise is critical to success.

Andy Hagan is General Manager, Investment at the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission, Te Waihanga. In this role he is responsible for the Commission’s work across the investment management lifecycle from infrastructure investment planning to delivery to asset management. Prior to working at the Commission, Andy spent almost 20 years at the New Zealand Treasury in a range of roles spanning financial markets, infrastructure and commercial issues, including as a member of the Treasury’s Executive Leadership Team. He has also consulted to a range of clients, primarily focussing on infrastructure funding and financing. Andy has a Master of Business from the University of Otago and was awarded the New Zealand Public Service Medal for outstanding public service in 2022.

Advanced corrosion modelling for lifetime extension of overhead power transmission lines

Transpower’s Transmission lines span over 12,000 kilometres across New Zealand. The lines traverse through varying terrain such as the benign Central Otago region right through to extreme salt spray and corrosion areas such as Tiwai and Oteranga Bay. The terrain makes corrosion highly localised with salt transport coming many kilometres inland due to wind funnelling. With an aging fleet, the forecasted reconductoring spend over the next 15 years was increasing from $50M to $250M per year.

Historically the conductor health model forecasting replacements used age and an expected life using conductor type, location and where it was known that the conductor was not fully greased (grease holidays). This would be manually adjusted for observed condition and eddy current “Cormon” testing that detects the zinc galvanising loss on the steel core strands. While these methods are relatively advanced by international standards, they have remained inherently conservative. Transpower needed a model that could confidently and safely extend the forecasted replacement life.

Drone condition assessment and the defect model has provided Transpower with the ability to manage the risk and flatten the reconductoring curve. It allows for a manageable ramp up in heavy wiring crew resources, reduces revenue price shocks and buys time to align replacements with tactical upgrades to incorporate new power demand.

The defect model uses drone visual data being acquired alongside accelerated corrosion testing, and destructive testing. Corrosion of the aluminium strands in Aluminium Clad Steel Reinforced (ACSR) creates a white corrosion product that fills the void spaces between strands and creates bulges. The model can assess if the conductor is safe to maintain in service and predict when it will become unsafe. The model uses Finite Element sub-modelling of bulges, and a power line design global modelling program (PLS-CADD) for defined weather cases and risk profiles. The challenges include automated image processing, storage and retrieval of drone data. Defects are classified as broken strands, white powder, bulging, strands out of lay, spacer damage, copper corrosion etc, with the white power bulges in ACSR cables being processed further by the defect model. The model includes modelling the increases in temperature at bulges due to loss of aluminium cross-sectional area, and the decrease in yield stress and ultimate tensile stress.

The defect growth rate has been estimated to forecast replacement in the longer term. The model was calibrated using destructive testing of ex-service samples and accelerated corrosion/salt spray cabinet samples. Corrosion maps based on historical changes in condition assessment data, and a NZ industry standard based on atmospheric corrosion of coupons, are used to estimate the defect growth rates.

Kevin Stevens has worked as a Performance Engineer/Asset Modeller at Transpower NZ Ltd since May 2020. Prior to that he was a Senior Consultant in the petrochemical and energy sectors at MPT Solutions/Quest Integrity Group, 2010 to 2019. MPT was a spinoff company from the metallurgy and corrosion teams within Industrial Research Ltd (a New Zealand Crown Research Institute), where Kevin worked as a senior scientist from 1993 to 2010. Kevin undertook his academic training with a BSc(Hons) and PhD at Victoria University of Wellington, from 1986 to 1993.

Cijina Lazo-Ron is an experienced engineer that started her career in Network Planning of the Distribution grid in South Africa in 2009. Since then, she has spent time undertaking overhead line designs, before moving to New Zealand. Since 2017, Cijina has been with Transpower’s Asset Planning team, having led many of the Transmission lines portfolios. Cijina currently heads up the Asset Planning Transmission Lines team, with a focus on strategic planning and portfolio improvements to improve asset health. Cijina career to date is marked by a passion for driving innovation into the energy sector.

In infrastructure landscape, innovation is often heralded as the catalyst for transformation. Yet, as we embrace new technologies, methodologies, and paradigms, a paradox emerges: the more we change, the more it stays the same. This discussion explores how innovation—while reshaping tools, processes, and expectations—often reinforces the enduring principles of aligning or adopting standards, disciplined delivery and good governance.

Looking at AT asset management we’ll examine how digital twins, automated and rapid data collection predictive analytics have improved delivery. However, these innovations consistently circle back to foundational principles

In particular, we reflect on the growing expectation of artificial intelligence as a perceived panacea. While AI offers powerful tools for forecasting and optimisation, there are few magic solutions. Advocates of AI as the ultimate saviour should heed the old statistical warning: “lies, damned lies, and statistics.”, we could about to embark on data, damned data and AI. Without context, oversight, and critical thinking, even the most advanced models risk reinforcing bias or obscuring nuance.

This discussion challenges attendees to rethink innovation not as disruption, but as evolution—a means of refining what already works or what could work better to answer old and new problem. It highlights how embracing change can deepen our commitment to enduring principles, ensuring that while our methods evolve, our mission remains constant.

 

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City Rail Link – The Rail Assets journey from requirements through to entering service

The City Rail Link (CRL) represents a transformative leap in Auckland’s transport infrastructure, with its rail assets forming the backbone of a modern, high-capacity urban transit system.

This presentation traces the journey of the CRL’s rail assets —from the initial articulation of stakeholder and operational requirements, through detailed design and construction installation and inspections, to the rigorous assurance processes of dynamic train testing, prior to the rail assets being accepted into KiwiRail’s network for operational service.

Bevan Assink is KiwiRail’s Programme Director leading KiwiRail’s engagement in New Zealand’s largest infrastructure initiative. With a strategic and operational remit. Bevan oversees KiwiRail’s interface with the CRL project, including KiwiRail’s capital delivery programme to upgrade specific Auckland Metro stations as part of CRL readiness, and leads the internal integration workstream to inform and prepare KiwiRail’s Infrastructure business units for the adoption of new CRL assets and operating models. His leadership ensures KiwiRail’s contributions to system integration, operational readiness, stakeholder engagement, and regulatory safety case development are aligned with the successful incorporation of CRL into the Auckland Metro Rail Network.

 

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Sweating the Data Assets

Asset management maturity is sometimes seen as a proxy for asset management performance. The typical asset management maturity assessment seeks detailed evidence on how the organisation plans to achieve its asset management objectives and how those plans are being implemented by teams every day. A corresponding diagnostic on how well the asset management system is performing in terms of risk, cost and performance outcomes is usually missing.

This presentation will discuss case studies that apply quantitative analysis of data that are often available but buried in asset management information systems, to provide deeper, more actionable insights, including early warning indicators not visible in high-level reports.

 

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Smart Seeds: Empowering Emerging Leaders Through Innovation

Smart Seeds is a design-led innovation program that empowers emerging leaders to find solutions to complex challenges. Participants build critical innovation skills and valuable networks while collaborating in multi-organisational teams.

This high energy presentation will show you a different approach to learning through a hands-on collaboration beyond traditional online courses focused on addressing challenges impacting your clients and community.

Emerging Leaders from social agencies government, consultants, contractors are brought together to collaborate towards resolving complex issues facing our communities empowering them to innovate, advocate and influence change.
The presentation will describe the journey and share some amazing stories from our Emerging Leaders.

Maurice is passionate about people, experience, leadership, and achieving outcomes for communities in energy, water, transport, buildings and environment. Maurice is a Principal at GHD with oversight of NZ Pacific strategy, markets and regions. Blending strategy with a sense of purpose, Maurice’s career is shaped by a quest to reshape industries and make the world a better place, one sustainable decision at a time. He has spent 30 years on 3 continents in water, energy, and transportation as a policy advisor, project manager, technical director, sustainability advocate, innovation practitioner, and now change leader. Achievements include the startup of a global digital business; guiding the transformation of an energy firm with a carbon footprint bigger than the UK’s; and getting Smarts Seeds off the ground in New Zealand – an innovation and leadership programme for emerging leaders in the infrastructure sector.

 

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