The draft of the new international standard for asset management, ISO 55000, will be released for review in the “next couple of weeks”, according to IPWEA’s Peter Way.
Way, the Chair of IPWEA’s NAMS.AU and the representative on the Australian Mirror Committee for the standard, says the standard is on track to become operational in 2014.
“The new standard follows a similar line to the other ISO management standards, such as the standards for quality management and risk management,” Way said.
“We are quite excited about it. We believe it will give infrastructure management organisations a better guide in order to achieve best practice.
“Of course, an ISO standard can potentially be called up by regulators to ensure compliance, so this provides a good framework.”
The standards actually comprise three separate standards: ISO 55000, which contains the overall principles and definitions; ISO 55001, which contains the actual requirements; and ISO 55002, which contains guidance on implementing the requirements.
“The second set of standards will certainly increase the focus on covering all bases of asset management,” Way said. “There are some new things in the standards that will require increased leadership from the top-level management within an organisation.
“This will be a significant change for a lot of organisations. Many currently see asset management as a bit of a backroom exercise. This will certainly raise it to boardroom level.”
Once the draft is circulated, each country involved will have the opportunity to comment on the standards and vote on them progressing to final ISO stage.
The project committee developing the standard will meet in Calgary, Canada next May to respond to feedback and finalise the standards. The final documents will be circulated and voted once more. If the standards succeed at the ballot, they will become operational in March 2014.
The draft of the ISO 55000 standards will be available on the IPWEA Asset Management Community of Practice site upon its release. Stay tuned to future issues of Asset E-news for more information.