Alpine Energy

Alpine Energy is now managing its capital planning and delivery projects in one integrated solution

Case study highlights

  • Now managing capital planning in one system
  • Went from limited control and auditing to a fully-gated process
  • Strengthened asset management practices

Challenge

Situated in the middle of New Zealand’s South Island, Alpine Energy owns and operates the electricity distribution network in the South Canterbury region.

Alpine Energy was experiencing issues managing its capital planning and delivery projects via a legacy solution, which had limited capabilities and only handled one part of the project lifecycle.

“All we had at the time was a system called Delphi, our homegrown access database, which captured risks and potential projects,” said Andrew Spackman, Maintenance & Asset Information Manager at Alpine Energy.

“It didn't really go too much further than that and a lot of work, such as risk scoring and reporting, had to be done outside the tool.”

Spackman said the manual processes resulted in siloed data, poor integration and management having minimal visibility over what was going on.

The Regulators and our Board had greater expectations in relation to how we manage our capital projects and wanted us to have better reporting capabilities, all of which is in line with our aim of good asset management practice in accordance with ISO 55000” .

Maintenance & Asset Information Manager
Alpine Energy

Project Lifecycle Management has provided us with a complete, end-to-end process in one tool.

Solution

Alpine Energy implemented TechnologyOne’s Project Lifecycle Management (PLM) software to manage this process in one integrated solution.

“Initially we were looking at TechnologyOne’s Enterprise Asset Management product (EAM), but that was a step beyond what we were ready for, so we opted to develop a small business case for Project Lifecycle Management,” Spackman said.

By introducing PLM, Alpine Energy is taking an additional step to operate more efficiently, saving the energy network time and money.

Maintenance & Asset Information Manager
Alpine Energy

We had remote support from TechnologOne’s R&D team, which from a customer’s perspective, is like finding gold in your backyard.

Outcome

Alpine Energy is now optimising its capital works programs and managing all project processes using best practice portfolio, program and project management methodologies.

“PLM has provided us with a complete, end-to-end process in one tool,” Spackman said.

“From initiation to finalisation, we no longer have to step outside the software.”

Spackman added: “The comparison between what we had before and what we have now is night and day.”

Alpine Energy's perspective

IT projects can be complex and costly. However, there are certain things you can do to lower the risk profile, accelerate time to implementation and keep costs down. In Alpine Energy’s case, implementing TechnologyOne’s preconfigured PLM software with little customisation, simplified the project and ensured it could be delivered on time and budget.

“Overall we tried to keep the business change as small as possible; we didn't make any changes to the out of the box workflow, which for us made the process a whole lot easier,” Spackman said.

“TechnologyOne provided some initial remote training for us, but we decided to tackle most of the implementation and configuration in house, given our budget was limited.”

Being an early adopter of the software, Alpine Energy also had access to TechnologyOne’s R&D team to ensure the solution worked seamlessly and was fit for purpose.

“During this process, we had remote support from TechnologOne’s R&D team, which from a customer’s perspective, is like finding gold in your backyard,” Spackman said.

“Being able to talk to R&D and get direct information about something you’re trying to do with the product was invaluable.”

Spotlight

Project Lifecycle Management forms part of TechnologyOne’s Enterprise Asset Management solution, which takes an enterprise approach to managing assets with a single view across your organisation.

PLM will enable Alpine Energy to improve its long-term infrastructure planning processes, including project submissions, funding allocations and approvals.

“It’s really a bit of a game changer from what we were previously able to produce,” Spackman said.

“We’ve gone from no integration to one intregrated system, limited visibility to full visibility, and no traceability to a fully compliant and auditable process.”

Spackman credited the project’s success to not changing the preconfigured workflows, implementing in stages and having direct support from TechnologyOne.

“We used what was there and kept the business change as small as possible,” he said.

“This has allowed us to go from no control to a fully-gated process, without much effort on our part.”

About Alpine Energy

Alpine Energy owns and operates the electricity distribution network in South Canterbury, New Zealand.

Alpine Energy website

Publish date

30 Jul 2020

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