Infrastructure Management Lead (KTP Associate)

We are seeking to appoint a high calibre motivated individual to work at PSW Integrity Ltd.’s offices in Birkenhead, Wirral, Merseyside, www.pswintegrity.co.uk/ to deliver an exciting Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP) with the Civil Infrastructure Research Cluster (CIRC), in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, at the University of Liverpool (UoL). This is an industry-led project, which also requires occasional visits at UoL to access specialist facilities.

The post is a two-year Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP) Associate with potential to lead on to a permanent position within PSW Integrity.

The Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP) iuk-ktp.org.uk/ is a UK-wide innovation programme designed to facilitate knowledge exchange and long-lasting partnerships between businesses and universities. The KTP provides funding for graduates (known as KTP Associates) to work on challenging strategic projects at the cutting-edge of current research and innovation. The KTP is administered by Innovate UK (national innovation agency) and has a global reputation for providing excellent training and career progression opportunities for recent graduates. Although a University employee through the KTP funding, the successful applicant will spend 90% of their time working as part of a business innovation team within PSW Integrity. While day-to-day work of the Associate will be managed by the company
supervisor, regular meetings with academic supervisors will also take place to discuss progress and issues.
The current expertise and capability of PSW Integrity is extending into advanced performance assessment of critical civil infrastructure, especially located offshore, exposed to harsh maritime environments or threatened by multiple natural hazards and increasing climate change effects.
The CIRC team at UoL has developed robust digital system assessment approaches for reliability analysis and evaluation of structural integrity based on digital twins of civil infrastructure. The aim of the KTP is to adapt these to enable PSW Integrity to perform proactive maintenance of critical infrastructure. To do so, the existing technology used by the company to perform condition monitoring and evaluation of structural integrity will be integrated into a systemic approach for computationally efficient structural health monitoring of systems exposed to multiple natural hazards. Moreover, multi-physic sensors will be refined and repackaged to monitor both structural and environmental response quantities. Comprehensive parametric studies will be carried out through refined and computationally efficient digital twins of case study offshore infrastructure to derive robust guidelines for proactive asset management. This systemic approach follows the “consequence-based engineering” framework developed at the University of Liverpool for asset management of complex infrastructure exposed by multiple natural hazards. The Infrastructure Management Lead, supported by the UoL academic team,
will also evaluate the cost-benefits of using newly developed standardised approaches, and will be engaged in transferring knowledge and building new capability with the team of PSW Integrity consultant engineers. All the above activities carried out and led by the Associate will contribute to enhancing the efficiency and robustness of traditional approaches used by PSW Integrity for Reliability Engineering, Condition Monitoring and Lean Manufacturing Consultations.
The prospective candidate should have been involved in maintenance best practices, understand principles of condition monitoring practices, specifically vibration analysis, and possess proven asset experience in some of these areas:
• Asset Management
• Lean Manufacturing
• Assessment and Optimisation of Operations and Spares
• Best Practice Workflows for Operations and Maintenance
• Condition Monitoring
• Reliability Roadmap Development and Asset Integrity Management
• FMEA, FMECA, RCA.

Key role duties:
Designing and engineering set-ups for accurate experimental tests should be handled by the KTP Associate. Teamworking is also required to interact with UoL academics and colleagues in PSW Integrity offices, as well as with the company’s clients and stakeholders. Adequate presentation skills are essential to disseminate the outcomes of the KTP during seminars and workshops both internally and externally.
Main responsibilities of the role will include:
• Leading the development and implementation of advanced structural health monitoring systems for critical infrastructure assets.
• Undertaking comprehensive parametric studies through the use of refined and computationally efficient digital twins of offshore and maritime infrastructure.
• Integrating PSW Integrity’s existing condition monitoring technologies within a proactive, consequence-based asset management framework.
• Carrying out cost-benefit analyses and assessing the operational impact of newly developed standardised approaches to asset integrity management.
• Facilitating effective knowledge transfer between the University of Liverpool and PSW Integrity, contributing to the upskilling and capability development of the PSW Integrity engineering team.
• Supporting the continued growth and business development of PSW Integrity through the enhancement of its service offering in reliability engineering, condition monitoring, and lean manufacturing consultancy.
• Preparing high-quality technical reports, academic publications, and presentations to communicate project findings to a range of audiences, including industrial partners and academic collaborators.

Additional requirements:
A professional candidate is required, ideally with a Master’s degree or with a PhD in Civil/Infrastructure/Mechanical Engineering. The Associate should have computational skills to conduct hands-on activities in the materials and structural laboratory in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at UoL, plus use these skills in applied company project work.