Reliability Modeling of Infrastructure Load-Sharing Systems With Workload Adjustment

Abstract

Motivated by the need to support effective asset management of infrastructure systems, this paper presents a novel reliability model for a load-sharing system where the operator can adjust component work load to balance system degradation. The operator-intervention effect, combined with other system complexities, makes modeling reliability interesting and challenging. We first develop cost modeling for a load-sharing system that has experienced operational service at the time of analysis. The system replacement process is modeled as a delayed renewal process for which the expected operational cost of the system is derived. A numerical algorithm is proposed to compute the cost, and the error bound is shown to be of order $O(n^{-1})$ . Next, we extend modeling to consider multiple heterogeneous systems located at different sites within the infrastructure network. Heterogeneities here refer to possible cross-site differences in the operating environments and the operators’ actions. When the heterogeneities are observable, we model as covariates; otherwise, we model as random effects. Statistical inference methods are developed for the proposed models. An example using real data from a water utility illustrates the logical model behavior given parameter choices as well as showing how analysis might inform asset management.