If one engineering team does their job right, viewers of the Brisbane Olympics might not realise they’re witnessing world-class engineering.
When half the world’s population tunes in to watch the Brisbane 2032 Olympics and Paralympics, the last thing anyone should notice is the infrastructure.
But behind the scenes lies years of meticulous planning to prevent the kind of catastrophic failures that have plagued critical infrastructure and major events in recent years.
For Jared Lillywhite FIEAust CPEng EngExec, an electrical engineer at Aurecon with 25 years’ experience designing major infrastructure projects, the challenge is both exciting and daunting.
“What makes it unique is that the bulk of people who are experiencing the event are doing so remotely,” he said.
The digital technology broadcasting of the games is an added layer of critical infrastructure for a harmonious event. Furthermore, unlike a typical piece of infrastructure that serves a consistent purpose, Brisbane 2032’s infrastructure must scale from zero to maximum capacity and then to its legacy purpose – all while the world is watching.
A single point of failure, whether in power systems, transport networks or cyber security, could become a global embarrassment.
Studying what’s gone wrong at previous Olympics and major events – power infrastructure, for instance – is vital. Cascading delays can be caused by transport bottlenecks, Lillywhite said, where “failure in that logistical infrastructure can have significant ramifications”.
Risk-based design philosophy
Drawing on Aurecon’s extensive work in data centres and industrial process sectors, where uptime is critical and downtime costs are astronomical, Lillywhite’s team is applying hard-won lessons to Olympic infrastructure.
“It’s very easy for engineers to launch into solution-mode,” he said. “Instead, we take a step back and apply a risk-based assessment framework, running scenarios and grading risks in terms of likelihood and consequence with input from our stakeholders.”
For the Olympics, those stakeholders are extraordinarily diverse, located globally and often have competing interests. Once risks are mapped, the team can design appropriate mitigation strategies.
“The likelihood of power going out at the main stadium might be really low, but the consequence of it happening during the opening ceremony is huge. That means we need to have an increased level of resilience in the infrastructure associated with that facility, such as dual suppliers from alternative locations, backup or parallel standby generation.”
Determining the right level of risk mitigation requires iterative scenario modelling.
“We consider whether a solution pulls the likelihood of risk down to an appropriate level,” Lillywhite said. “If it doesn’t, we go further up the infrastructure tree and build in more resilience or redundancy until the risk reaches an acceptable point.”
READ: What can Brisbane 2032 learn from Paris?
Keeping it simple
There’s another crucial principle underlying all of this: simplicity. Quoting Leonardo da Vinci’s maxim that “simplicity is the ultimate sophistication”, Lillywhite is alert to the temptation to over-engineer.
“It’s easy with technology trends and engineers to get caught up in overcomplicating things, adding more and more layers into interconnecting systems. Wherever possible, my personal approach is to try and simplify, and build flexibility into infrastructure.”
His philosophy extends to technology choices: “I often use the term ‘innovative application of proven technology’. It’s one thing to be innovative and come up with something novel, but my recommendation is to apply proven technologies in an innovative way. You can innovate around the edges, but use infrastructure that’s been tried and tested.”
Testing reality
Aurecon’s toolbox for putting plans into place includes digital twins, which support both design-phase modelling and operational monitoring, and pedestrian modelling, which it conducts upfront to understand how people move through transport and public infrastructure. Many of the design decisions made are influenced directly by these movement patterns.
Yet for an event the size and scale of the Olympics, all the desktop modelling and simulation in the world can’t replace the real thing. One of the keys is to validate that desktop work through physical testing – running failure scenarios in real life, such as simulating a power outage at the main stadium and running through the process to validate the redundancy plans.
Designing for legacy
While all eyes will be on that month of the games, there’s also the important consideration of what happens after the closing ceremony.
“It’s very easy to get caught up in designing for games,” Lillywhite said. “We generally take the approach of designing the legacy function – what is the long-term use of this piece of infrastructure or this facility – design for that first and foremost, and then overlaying the Olympics on it.”
With many previous hosts being plagued by ‘white elephant’ venues, Lillywhite points to the London Olympics as a successful example of legacy planning: infrastructure benefits the community long after the athletes have gone home.
Looking ahead to 2032, Lillywhite’s team faces one final challenge: forecasting risks that don’t yet exist.
“We’re designing infrastructure now that will be deployed in 2032 and well beyond that. Particularly trying to forecast what physical security and cybersecurity risks will look like in six years’ time.”
When billions of people tune in to watch Brisbane 2032, the goal is for them to experience world-class athletic performances. If Lillywhite and his team succeed, the viewers might not realise it, but they’ll be witnessing world-class engineering, too.
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