Integrated Vegetation Management in Rights-of-Way (Part 1)

Part 1: The corridors that keep Australia running, and the opportunity to improve how we manage vegetation

Integrated Vegetation Management in Australian rights-of-way | Part 1 of 2

Linear infrastructure is the circulatory system of the Australian economy. Electricity transmission and distribution lines, gas and water pipelines, rail corridors and road reserves stretch across tens of thousands of kilometres of country. Almost all of that distance runs through vegetation, and the way it is managed inside those easements (a.k.a. rights-of-way) directly shapes safety, reliability and cost outcomes for the communities served by these assets. There is a real opportunity to progress vegetation management on Australian rights-of-way from a recurring maintenance task to a strategic asset management activity, and the case for doing so is becoming stronger.

Each corridor type carries its own vegetation profile and its own opportunities. On the power network, well-managed vegetation supports reliable electricity supply, reduces fire ignition risk during high-risk weather, and keeps trees a safe distance from conductors, which matters during natural disasters such as fires and storms. On rail, the right vegetation profile protects ballast, preserves driver line-of-sight and supports signalling reliability. On road corridors, good vegetation management supports line-of-sight at intersections and curves, visual amenity and bushfire mitigation. In pipeline rights-of-way, low-growing vegetation enables leak detection, corrosion surveys and emergency access, while preserving the wildlife and habitat values.

The investment involved is significant. In Australia, electrical distribution and transmission vegetation management alone represents an annual spend in the order of $500M p.a. This investment is what keeps the lights on, the trains running and communities safe, and there is real scope to make every dollar of it work harder.

Where the improvements can be made in partnership

Many rights-of-way in Australia are still maintained under cyclical, unit-rate contracts in which a contractor delivers vegetation management across a defined area - on a defined cycle and is paid by the unit of work performed. This model has served the industry well for decades, however there is an opportunity to evolve it. Three areas stand out. The first is that unit-rate contracts reward volume of work rather than long-term outcome, which can quietly limit the appetite for undertaking treatments that suppress future regrowth. The second is that each cycle tends to return the vegetation to a starting state and then waits for it to grow back, so the corridor is reset rather than progressed. The third is that customer and contractor goals can drift apart, because asset owners are seeking lower long-term cost while contractor margin is tied to continued work volumes. Aligning customer and contractor goals is one of the biggest levers available to the industry.

Asset managers are being asked to do more with less. Budgets are being scrutinised, compliance and safety expectations are rising, and the workforce that has historically delivered cyclical clearing in Australia is changing in shape. Industry conversations consistently point to the same conclusion: the next decade is one of energy transition, and there is real room for the model to evolve as bushfire risk profiles shift, as regulators refine their expectations of network operators, and as communities place greater value on reliability and environmental stewardship.

When contracts reward outcomes (safety and reliability) rather than outputs (number of hectares cut), the corridor and the budget both benefit, and crews are freed to apply the right treatment for each site.

The following post in this series will examine the potential outcomes of managing rights-of-way through an Integrated Vegetation Management approach. It will detail the practical processes involved and discuss contract frameworks that enable linear infrastructure asset managers to achieve more sustainable, long-term results.