Partnership for the Advancement of Infrastructure and Its Renewal Through Innovative Technologies (PAIR) White Paper.
Partnership for the Advancement of Infrastructure and
Its Renewal Through Innovative Technologies (PAIR) White
Paper.
(2058 K)
Civil Engineering Research Foundation
NIST GCR 98-765; 24 p. September 1998.
Sponsor:
National Institute of Standards and Technology,
Gaithersburg, MD
Available from:
INFORMATION ON PAIR contact: The Civil Engineering
Research Foundation (PAIR Secretariat), 1015 15th
Street, NW, Suite 600, Washington, DC 20005.
Telephone: 202-842-0555.
Fax: 202-789-2943.
Website:
www.cerf.org. Email: corporate@cerf.org
Order number: PB99-117178
Keywords:
infrastructure
Abstract:
Each person and every business depends on the nation's
infrastructure, but innovation in infrastructure is not
always keeping pace with business innovation and market
demands and human needs. Modernizing and maintaining our
infrastructure-by some estimates likely to require a
more than $1.3 trillion investment-represent both a
pressing national need and a tremendous market
opportunity for innovative products and practices.
Unless private sector businesses and government join in
a collaborative effort to accelerate the pace of
infrastructure innovation, America's 21st century
businesses will be shackled by the high costs of an
ineffective, decayed, inadequate, and obsolete
infrastructure. Further, we will miss global market
opportunities for developing new ideas, science, and
technology to improve infrastructure. Yet we lack both
broad public appreciation of the problems and
opportunities, and solid constituency for infrastructure
innovation that spans infrastructure's functional range:
telecommunications, utilities, water supply and
sewerage, transportation, and public facilities.
Leaders from industry, non-government organizations,
academia, and the public sector have come together to
support and build this constituency. This
initiative-which we have termed the Partnership for the
Advancement of Infrastructure and its Renewal
(PAIR)-seeks to accelerate product and process
innovation in the construction, maintenance and repair
of our nation's infrastructure. PAIR's basic premise is
that all of us, in both the private and public sectors,
are users of the infrastructure and therefore
stakeholders in its advancement and renewal. Together we
can motivate and shape collective action.
Building and Fire Research Laboratory
National Institute of Standards and Technology
Gaithersburg, MD 20899