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Water services are a strategic sector of large social and economic relevance. It is therefore essential that they are managed rationally and efficiently. Advanced water supply and wastewater infrastructure asset management (IAM) is key in achieving adequate levels of service in the future, particularly with regard to reliable and high quality drinking water supply, prevention of urban flooding, efficient use of natural resources and prevention of pollution. This paper presents a methodology for supporting the development of urban water IAM, developed during the AWARE-P project as well as an appraisal of its implementation in four water utilities. Both water supply and wastewater systems were considered. Due to the different contexts and features of the utilities, the main concerns vary from case to case; some problems essentially are related to performance, others to risk. Cost is a common deciding factor. The paper describes the procedure applied, focusing on the diversity of drivers, constraints, benefits and outcomes. It also points out the main challenges and the results obtained through the implementation of a structured procedure for supporting urban water IAM. 1 6 2702-2711pp doi:10.2166/wst.2012.509 Water Science & Technology DHA/NES

Water services are a strategic sector of large social and economic relevance. Thus, it is essential that they are managed rationally and efficiently. Advanced water supply and wastewater infrastructure asset management is key in achieving adequate levels of service in the future, particularly with regard to reliable and high quality drinking water supply, prevention of urban flooding, efficient use of natural resources and prevention of pollution. This paper presents an appraisal of the implementation in four Portuguese water utilities of a methodology for supporting the development of urban water infrastructure asset management (IAM), developed during the AWARE-P project. Both water supply systems and wastewater systems were considered. Due to the different characteristics of the operators, the main concerns vary from case to case; some problems are related essentially to performance, others to risk. Cost is a deciding factor that is common to all utilities. The paper describes the applied procedure focusing on the existing differences, drivers, constraints, major benefits and outcomes. It also points out the main challenges and the results obtained by the implementation of a structured procedure for supporting urban water IAM. 1 6 10p DHA/NES 2011 27 a 30 de Setembro de 2011

The AWARE-P project aims to promote the application of integrated and risk-based approaches to the rehabilitation of urban water supply and wastewater drainage systems. Central to the project is the development of a software platform based on a set of computational components, which assist in the analyses and decision support involved in the planning process for sustainable infrastructural asset management. The AWARE-P software system brings together onto a common platform the infrastructural geo- referenced data that describe the physical water supply or sewerage systems, as well as a variety of data originating in the several information systems that exist in the water utility corporate environment, such as maintenance and work orders data, billing and costs databases, or network analysis models. Building on those, it makes available an organized set of userconfigurable assessment algorithms related to performance, cost and risk, which are used to evaluate alternative system configurations or planning solutions, against current and projected or hypothetical scenarios. 6 10p DHA/NES 2011 27 a 30 de Setembro