Copperleaf Wraps Up PIPES 2020
At Copperleaf™, providing opportunities for our community of clients, partners and team members to network, share knowledge, and learn from each other’s successes and experiences is a key priority—to help drive our industries forward. This year, we hosted our first PIPES (Pipeline Investment Planning Excellence Summit) event, which brought together over 100 clients in the natural gas and water sectors. Each year at the Copperleaf Summit, one of the most popular sessions is the “Segment Summits”, where clients within the same industry get together to openly discuss challenges they’re facing and share best practices and success stories. It also gives participants the chance to establish and build professional relationships that extend beyond the event.
The shift to a virtual Summit this year meant that there was no opportunity for clients to connect the way they have in the past, and so the PIPES event was born! We put together a steering team made up entirely of volunteers from our pipeline clients from the US, the UK, and Canada. They dedicated countless hours to help plan the event, champion it to their teams, develop content, and lead breakout sessions. It was fantastic to work with such a dedicated group of people, who went above and beyond to support an event completely outside of their day jobs.
Together with Copperleaf, we are developing a strong, collaborative, and engaged community.
Chris Royce
Head of Strategic Investment Management
Anglian Water
The event gave attendees from various departments, including asset management, IT, investment and capital planning, and engineering, the chance to hear from their peers and ask questions about strategy, process, and implementation. We kicked things off with a keynote on the importance of asset management by Wayne Bryce, President and CEO of JANA, one of our key partners in the gas industry in North America. We then moved into several rounds of breakouts on the following topics:
- Developing and managing strategic asset management plans
- Work plan development and performance
- Risk tolerance and modeling
- Exploring alternatives and their constraints
- Reporting to stakeholders
A learning experience for all, Matt Fulghum, Director of Asset Management at ONE Gas and Chair of the PIPES steering team noted, “Even though all organizations are doing the same thing—moving product through pipelines—it’s incredible to learn how we utilize the Copperleaf Decision Analytics suite in different ways!” He added, “Being part of the Copperleaf Community, and participating in discussion forums like this, is valuable for sharing our business challenges. By joining together, we can help shape the future of Copperleaf’s solutions for the pipeline industry. And having the chance to connect with each other is a reminder that we’re all in this together, and together we can be successful!”
Being part of the Copperleaf Community, and participating in discussion forums like this, is valuable for sharing our business challenges. By joining together, we can help shape the future of Copperleaf’s solutions for the pipeline industry.
Matt Fulghum
Director of Asset Management
ONE Gas
Chris Royce, Head of Strategic Investment Management at Anglian Water, commented, “Together with Copperleaf, we are developing a strong, collaborative, and engaged community. This allows us to share best practices with each other allowing us all to enhance our asset management capabilities.”
As we approach the end of this extraordinarily strange year, PIPES 2020 served as an incredible way to bring people together. As the Copperleaf Community grows, I’m looking forward to working closely with our clients to come up with new and unique ways to engage with each other and keep the momentum moving forward!
If you are a Copperleaf client and would like to join our online forum, please contact [email protected] and we’ll be happy to set you up with an account. Keep checking the Community page for updates on the 2021 Copperleaf Summit (yes, it will be virtual in 2021) and other Community events.