Tag: AMI/AMR

Advanced Metering Infrastructure: The Case for Transformation

Although the most basic operational benefits of an advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) initiative can be achieved by simply implementing standard technological features and revamping existing processes, this approach fails to leverage the full potential of AMI to redefine the customer experience and transform the utility operating model. In addition to the obvious operational benefits – including a significant reduction in field personnel and a decrease in peak load on the system – AMI solutions have the potential to achieve broader strategic, environmental and regulatory benefits by redefining the utility-customer relationship. To capture these broader benefits, however, utilities must view AMI as a transformation initiative, not simply a technology implementation project. Utilities must couple their AMI implementations with a broader operational overhaul and take a structured approach to applying the operating capabilities required to take advantage of AMI’s vast opportunities. One key step in this structured approach to transformation is enterprise-wide business process design.

WHY “AS IS” PROCESSES WON’T WORK FOR AMI

Due to the antiquated and fragmented nature of utility processes and systems, adapting “as is” processes alone will not be sufficient to realize the full range of AMI benefits. Multiple decades of industry consolidation have resulted in utilities with diverse business processes reflecting multiple legacy company operating practices. Associated with these diverse business processes is a redundant set of largely homegrown applications resulting in operational inefficiencies that may impact customer service and reliability, and prevent utilities from adapting to new strategic initiatives (such as AMI) as they emerge.

For example, in the as-is environment, utilities are often slow to react to changes in customer preferences and require multiple functional areas to respond to a simple customer request. A request by a customer to enroll in a new program, for example, will involve at least three organizations within the utility: the call center initially handles the customer request; the field services group manages changing or reprogramming the customer’s meter to support the new program; and the billing group processes the request to ensure that the customer is correctly enrolled in the program and is billed accordingly. In most cases, a simple request like this can result in long delays to the customer due to disjointed processes with multiple hand-off points.

WHY USE AMI AS THE CATALYST FOR OPERATIONAL TRANSFORMATION?

The revolutionary nature of AMI technology and its potential for application to multiple areas of the utility makes an AMI implementation the perfect opportunity to adapt the utility operating structure. To use AMI as a platform for operational transformation, utilities must shift their thought paradigm from functionally based to enterprise-wide, process-centric environments. This approach will ensure that utilities take full advantage of AMI’s technological capabilities without being constrained by existing processes and organizational structures.

If the utility is to offer new programs and services as well as respond to shifting external demands, it must anticipate and respond quickly to changes in behaviors. Rapid information dissemination and quick response to changes in business, environmental and economic situations are essential for utilities that wish to encourage customers to think of energy in a new way and proactively manage their usage through participation in time-of-use and real-time demand response programs. This transition requires that system and organizational hand-offs be integrated to create a seamless and flexible work flow. Without this integration, utilities cannot proactively and quickly adapt processes to satisfy ever-increasing customer expectations. In essence, AMI fails if “smart meters” and “smart systems” are implemented without “smart processes” to support them.

DESIGNING SMART PROCESSES

Designing smart future state business processes to support transformational initiatives such as AMI involves more than just rearranging existing works flows. Instead, a utility must adopt a comprehensive approach to business process design – one that engages stakeholders throughout the organization and that enables them to design processes from the ground up. The utility must also design flexible processes that can adapt to changing customer, technology, business and regulatory expectations while avoiding the pitfalls of the current organization and process structure. As part of a utility’s business process design effort, it must also redefine jobs more broadly, increase training to support those jobs, enable decision making by front-line personnel and redirect rewards systems to focus on processes as well as outcomes. Utilities must also reshape organizational cultures to emphasize teamwork, personnel accountability and the customer’s importance; to redefine roles and responsibilities so that managers oversee processes instead of activities and develop people rather then supervise them; and to realign information system so that they help cross-functional processes work smoothly rather than simply support individual functional areas.

BUSINESS PROCESS DESIGN FRAMEWORK

IBM’s enterprise-wide business process design framework provides a structured approach to the development of the future state processes that support operational transformations and the complexities of AMI initiatives. This framework empowers utilities to apply business process design as the cornerstone of a broader effort to transition to a customer-centric organization capable of engaging external stakeholders. In addition, this framework also supports corporate decision making and continuous improvement by emphasizing real-time metrics and measurement of operational procedures. The framework is made up of the following five phases (Figure 1):

Phase 1 – As-is functional assessment. During this phase, utilities assess their current state processes and supporting organizations and systems. The goal of this phase is to identify gaps, overlaps and conflicts with existing processes and to identify opportunities to leverage the AMI technology. This assessment requires utility stakeholders to dissect existing process throughout the organization and identify instances where the utility is unable to fully meet customer, environmental and regulatory demands. The final step in this phase is to define a set of “future state” goals to guide process development. These goals must address all of the relevant opportunities to both improve existing processes and perform new functions and services.

Phase 2 – Future state process analysis. During this phase, utilities design end-to-end processes that meet the future state goals defined in Phase 1. To complete this effort, utilities must synthesize components from multiple functional areas and think outside the current organizational hierarchy. This phase requires engagement from participants throughout the utility organization, and participants should be encouraged to envision all relevant opportunities for using AMI to improve the utility’s relationship with customers, regulators and the environment. At the conclusion of this phase, all processes should be assessed in terms of their ability to alleviate the current state issues and to meet the future state goals defined in Phase 1.

Phase 3 – Impact identification. During this phase, utilities identify the organizational structure and corporate initiatives necessary to “operationalize” the future state processes. Key questions answered during this phase include how will utilities transition from current to future state? How will each functional area absorb the necessary changes? And what are the new organizations, roles and skills needed? This phase requires the utility to think outside of the current organizational structure to identify the optimal way to support the processes designed in Phase 2. During the impact identification phase of business, it’s crucial that process be positioned as the dominant organizational axis. Because process-organized utilities are not bound to a conventional hierarchy or fixed organizational structure, they can be customer-centric, make flexible use of their resources and respond rapidly to new business situations.

Phase 4 – Socialization. During this phase, utilities focus on obtaining ownership and buy-in from the impacted organizations and broader group of internal and external stakeholders. This phase often involves piloting the new processes and technology in a test environment and reaching out to a small set of customers to solicit feedback. This phase is also marked by the transition of the products from the first three phases of the business process design effort to the teams affected by the new processes – namely the impacted business areas as well as the organizational change management and information technology teams.

Phase 5 – Implementation and measurement. During the final phase of the business process design framework, the utility transitions from planning and design to implementation. The first step of this phase is to define the metrics and key performance indicators (KPIs) that will be used to measure the success of the new processes – necessary if organizations and managers are to be held responsible for the new processes, and for guiding continuous refinement and improvement. After these metrics have been established, the new organizational structure is put in place and the new processes are introduced to this structure.

BENEFITS AND CHALLENGES OF BUSINESS PROCESS DESIGN

The business process design framework outlined above facilitates the permeation of the utility goals and objectives throughout the entire organization. This effort does not succeed, though, without significant participation from internal stakeholders and strong sponsorship from key executives.

The benefits of this approach include the following:

  • It facilitates ownership. Because the management team is engaged at the beginning of the AMI transformation, managers are encouraged to own future state processes from initial design through implementation.
  • It identifies key issues. A comprehensive business design effort allows for earlier visibility into key integration issues and provides ample time to resolve them prior to rolling out the technologies to the field.
  • It promotes additional capabilities. The business process framework enables the utility to develop innovative ways to apply the AMI technology and ensures that future state processes are aligned to business outcomes.
  • It puts the focus on customers. A thorough business process effort ensures that the necessary processes and functional groups are put in place to empower and inform the utility customer.

The challenges of this approach include the following:

  • It entails a complex transition. The utility must manage the complexities and ambiguities of shifting from functional-based operations to process-based management and decision making.
  • It can lead to high expectations. The utility must also manage stakeholder expectations and be clear that change will be slow and painful. Revolutionary change is made through evolutionary steps – meaning that utilities cannot expect to take very large steps at any point in the process.
  • There may be technological limitations. Throughout the business process design effort, utilities will identify new ways to improve customer satisfaction through the use of AMI technology. The standard technology, however, may not always support these visions; thus, utilities must be prepared to work with vendors to support the new processes.

Although execution of future state business process design undoubtedly requires a high degree of effort, a successful operational transformation is necessary to truly leverage the features of AMI technology. If utilities expect to achieve broad-reaching benefits, they must put in place the operational and organization structures to support the transformational initiatives. Utilities cannot afford to think of AMI as a standard technology implementation or to jump immediately to the definition of system and technology requirements. This approach will inevitably limit the impact of AMI solutions and leave utilities implementing cutting-edge technology with fragmented processes and inflexible, functionally based organizational structures.

Smart Metering Options for Electric and Gas Utilities

Should utilities replace current consumption meters with “smart metering” systems that provide more information to both utilities and customers? Increasingly, the answer is yes. Today, utilities and customers are beginning to see the advantages of metering systems that provide:

  • Two-way communication between the utility and the meter; and
  • Measurement that goes beyond a single consolidated quarterly or monthly consumption total to include time-of-use and interval measurement.

For many, “smart metering” is synonymous with an advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) that collects, processes and distributes metered data effectively across the entire utility as well as to the customer base (Figure 1).

SMART METERING REVOLUTIONIZES UTILITY REVENUE AND SERVICE POTENTIAL

When strategically evaluated and deployed, smart metering can deliver a wide variety of benefits to utilities.

Financial Benefits

  • Significantly speeds cash flow and associated earnings on revenue. Smart metering permits utilities to read meters and send the data directly to the billing application. Bills go out immediately, cutting days off the meter-to-cash cycle.
  • Improves return on investment via faster processing of final bills. Customers can request disconnects as the moving van pulls away. Smart metering polls the meter and gives the customer the amount of the final bill. Online or credit card payments effectively transform final bill collection cycles from a matter of weeks to a matter of seconds.
  • Reduces bad debt. Smart metering helps prevent bad debt by facilitating the use of prepayment meters. It also reduces the size of overdue bills by enabling remote disconnects, which do not depend on crew availability.

Operational Cost Reductions

  • Slashes the cost to connect and disconnect customers. Smart metering can virtually eliminate the costs of field crews and vehicles previously required to change service from the old to the new residents of a metered property.
  • Lowers insurance and legal costs. Field crew insurance costs are high – and they’re even higher for employees subject to stress and injury while disconnecting customers with past-due bills. Remote disconnects through smart metering lower these costs. They also reduce medical leave, disability pay and compensation claims. Remote disconnects also significantly cut the number of days that employees and lawyers spend on perpetrator prosecutions and attempts to recoup damages.
  • Cuts the costs of managing vegetation. Smart metering can pinpoint blinkouts, reducing the cost of unnecessary tree trimming.
  • Reduces grid-related capital expenses. With smart metering, network managers can analyze and improve block-by-block power flows. Distribution planners can better size transformers. Engineers can identify and resolve bottlenecks and other inefficiencies. The benefits include increased throughput and reductions in grid overbuilding.
  • Shaves supply costs. Supply managers use interval data to fine-tune supply portfolios. Because smart metering enables more efficient procurement and delivery, supply costs decline.
  • Cuts fuel costs. Many utility service calls are “false alarms.” Checking meter status before dispatching crews prevents many unnecessary truck rolls. Reduces theft. Smart metering can identify illegal attempts to reconnect meters, or to use energy and water in supposedly vacant premises. It can also detect theft by comparing flows through a valve or transformer with billed consumption.

Compliance Monitoring

  • Ensures contract compliance. Gas utilities can use one-hour interval meters to monitor compliance from interruptible, or “non-core,” customers and to levy fines against contract violators.
  • Ensures regulatory compliance. Utilities can monitor the compliance of customers with significant outdoor lighting by comparing similar intervals before and during a restricted time period. For example, a jurisdiction near a wildlife area might order customers to turn off outdoor lighting so as to promote breeding and species survival.
  • Reduces outage duration by identifying outages more quickly and pinpointing outage and nested outage locations. Smart metering also permits utilities to ensure outage resolution at every meter location.
  • Sizes outages more accurately. Utilities can ensure that they dispatch crews with the skills needed – and adequate numbers of personnel – to handle a specific job.
  • Provides updates on outage location and expected duration. Smart metering helps call centers inform customers about the timing of service restoration. It also facilitates display of outage maps for customer and public service use.
  • Detect voltage fluctuations. Smart metering can gather and report voltage data. Customer satisfaction rises with rapid resolution of voltage issues.

New Services

For utilities that offer services besides commodity delivery, smart metering provides an entry to such new business opportunities as:

  • Monitoring properties. Landlords reduce costs of vacant properties when utilities notify them of unexpected energy or water consumption. Utilities can perform similar services for owners of vacation properties or the adult children of aging parents.
  • Monitoring equipment. Power-use patterns can reveal a need for equipment maintenance. Smart metering enables utilities to alert owners or managers to a need for maintenance or replacement.
  • Facilitating home and small-business networks. Smart metering can provide a gateway to equipment networks that automate control or permit owners to access equipment remotely. Smart metering also facilitates net metering, offering some utilities a path toward involvement in small-scale solar or wind generation.

Environmental Improvements

Many of the smart metering benefits listed above include obvious environmental benefits. When smart metering lowers a utility’s fuel consumption or slows grid expansion, cleaner air and a better preserved landscape result. Smart metering also facilitates conservation through:

  • Leak detection. When interval reads identify premises where water or gas consumption never drops to zero, leaks are an obvious suspect.
  • Demand response and critical peak pricing. Demand response encourages more complete use of existing base power. Employed in conjunction with critical peak pricing, it also reduces peak usage, lowering needs for new generators and transmission corridors.
  • Load control. With the consent of the owner, smart metering permits utilities or other third parties to reduce energy use inside a home or office under defined circumstances.

CHALLENGES IN SMART METERING

Utilities preparing to deploy smart metering systems need to consider these important factors:

System Intelligence. There’s a continuing debate in the utility industry as to whether smart metering intelligence should be distributed or centralized. Initial discussions of advanced metering tended to assume intelligence embedded in meters. Distributed intelligence seemed part of a trend, comparable to “smart cards,” “smart locks” and scores of other everyday devices with embedded computing power.

Today, industry consensus favors centralized intelligence. Why? Because while data processing for purposes of interval billing can take place in either distributed or central locations, other applications for interval data and related communications systems cannot. In fact, utilities that opt for processing data at the meter frequently make it impossible to realize a number of the benefits listed above.

Data Volume. Smart metering inevitably increases the amount of meter data that utilities must handle. In the residential arena, for instance, using hour-long measurement intervals rather than monthly consumption totals replaces 12 annual reads per customer with 8,760 reads – a 730-fold increase.

In most utilities today, billing departments “own” metering data. Interval meter reads, however, are useful to many departments. These readings can provide information on load size and shape – data that can then be analyzed to help reduce generation and supply portfolio costs. Interval reads are even more valuable when combined with metering features like two-way communication between meter and utility, voltage monitoring and “last gasp” messages that signal outages.

This new data provides departments outside billing with an information treasure trove. But when billing departments control the data, others frequently must wait for access lest they risk slowing down billing to a point that damages revenue flow.

Meter Data Management. An alternative way to handle data volume and multiple data requests is to offload it into a stand-alone meter data management (MDM) application.

MDM applications gather and store meter data. They can also perform the preliminary processing required for different departments and programs. Most important, MDM gives all units equal access to commonly held meter data resources (Figure 2).

MDM provides an easy pathway between data and the multiple applications and departments that need it. Utilities can more easily consolidate and integrate data from multiple meter types, and reduce the cost of building and maintaining application interfaces. Finally, MDM provides a place to store and use data, whose flow into the system cannot be regulated – for example, in situations such as the flood of almost simultaneous messages from tens of thousands of meters sending a “last gasp” during a major outage.

WEIGHING THE COSTS AND BENEFITS OF SMART METERING

Smart metering on a mass scale is relatively new. No utility can answer all questions in advance. There are ways, however, to mitigate the risks:

Consider all potential benefits. Smart metering may be a difficult cost to justify if it rests solely on customer acceptance of demand response. Smart metering is easier to cost-justify when its deployment includes, for instance, the value of the many benefits listed above.

Evaluate pilots. Technology publications are full of stories about successful pilots followed by unsuccessful products. That’s because pilots frequently protect participants from harsh financial consequences. And it’s difficult for utility personnel to avoid spending time and attention on participants in ways that encourage them to buy into the program. Real-life program rollouts lack these elements.

Complicating the problem are likely differences between long-term and short-term behavior. The history of gasoline conservation programs suggests that while consumers initially embrace incentives to car pool or use public transportation, few make such changes on a permanent basis.

Examining the experiences of utilities in the smart metering forefront – in Italy, for example, or in California and Idaho – may provide more information than a pilot.

Develop a complete business case. Determining the cost-benefit ratio of smart metering is challenging. Some costs – for example, meter prices and installation charges – may be relatively easy to determine. Others require careful calculations. As an example, when interval meters replace time-of-use meters, how does the higher cost of interval meters weigh against the fact that they don’t require time-of-use manual reprogramming?

As in any business case, some costs must be estimated:

  • Will customer sign-up equal the number needed to break even?
  • How long will the new meters last?
  • Do current meter readers need to be retrained, and if so, what will that cost?
  • Will smart metering help retain customers that might otherwise be lost?
  • Can new services such as equipment efficiency analyses be offered, and if so, how much should the utility charge for them?

Since some utilities are already rolling out smart metering programs, it’s becoming easier to obtain real-life numbers (rather than estimates) to plug into your business case.

CONSIDER ALTERNATIVES

Technology is “smart” only when it reduces the cost of obtaining specified objectives. Utilities may find it valuable to try lower-cost routes to some results, including:

  • Customer charges to prevent unnecessary truck rolls. Such fees are common among telephone service providers and have worked well for some gas utilities responding to repeated false alarms from householder-installed carbon monoxide detectors.
  • Time-of-use billing with time/rate relationships that remain constant for a year or more. This gives consumers opportunities to make time-shifting a habit.
  • Customer education to encourage consumers to use the time-shifting features on their appliances as a contribution to the environment. Most consumers have no idea that electricity goes to waste at night. Keeping emissions out of the air and transmission towers out of the landscape could be far more compelling to many consumers than a relatively small saving resulting from an on- and off-peak pricing differential.
  • Month-to-month rate variability. One study found that approximately a third of the efficiency gains from real-time interval pricing could be captured by simply varying the flat retail rates monthly – and at no additional cost for metering. [1] While a third of the efficiency gains might not be enough to attain long-term goals, they might be enough to fill in a shorter-term deficit, permitting technology costs and regulatory climates to stabilize before decisions must be made.
  • Multitier pricing based on consumption. Today, two-tier pricing – that is, a lower rate for the first few-hundred kilowatt-hours per month and a higher rate for additional hours – is common. However, three or four tiers might better capture the attention of those whose consumption is particularly high – owners of large homes and pool heaters, for instance – without burdening those at the lower end of the economic ladder. Tiers plus exception handling for hardships like high-consuming medical equipment would almost certainly be less difficult and expensive than universal interval metering.

A thorough evaluation of the benefits and challenges of advanced metering systems, along with an understanding of alternative means to achieving those benefits, is essential to utilities considering deployment of advanced metering systems.

Note: The preceding was excerpted from the Oracle white paper “Smart Metering for Electric and Gas Utilities.” To receive the complete paper, Email oracleutilities_ww@oracle.com.

ENDNOTE

  1. Holland and Mansur, “The Distributional and Environmental Effects of Time-varying Prices in Competitive Electricity Markets.” Results published in “If RTP Is So Great, Why Don’t We See More of It?” Center for the Study of Energy Markets Research Review, University of California Energy Institute, Spring 2006. Available at www.ucei.berkeley.edu/

Intelligent Communications Platform Provides Foundation for Clean Technology Solutions to Smart Grid

Since the wake-up call of the 2003 blackout in the northeastern United States and Canada, there’s been a steady push to improve the North American power grid. Legislation in both the United States and Canada has encouraged investments in technologies intended to make the grid intelligent and to solve critical energy issues. The Energy Policy Act (EPAct) of 2005 mandated that each state evaluate the business case for advanced metering infrastructure (AMI). In Ontario, the Energy Conservation Responsibility Act of 2006 mandated deployment of smart meters to all consumers by 2010. And the recent U.S. Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 expands support from the U.S. government for investments in smart grid technologies while further emphasizing the need for the power industry to play a leadership role in addressing carbon dioxide emissions affecting climate change.

Recent state-level legislation and consumer sentiment suggest an increasing appetite for investments in distributed clean-technology energy solutions. Distributed generation technologies such as solar, wind and bio-diesel are becoming more readily available and have the potential to significantly improve grid operations and reliability.

THE NEXT STEP

Although the full vision for the smart grid is still somewhat undefined, most agree that an intelligent communications platform is a necessary foundation for developing and realizing this vision. Of the 10 elements that define the smart grid as contained within the Energy Act of 2007, more than half directly relate to or involve advanced capabilities for advanced communications.

A core business driver for intelligent communications is full deployment of smart metering, also referred to as advanced metering infrastructure. AMI involves automated measurement of time-of-use energy consumption – at either hourly or 15-minute intervals – and provides for new time-of-use rates that encourage consumers to use energy during off-peak hours when generation costs are low rather than peak periods when generation costs are high and the grid is under stress. With time-of-use rates, consumers may continue to use power during high peak periods but will pay a higher price to do so. AMI may also include remote service switch functionality that can reduce costs associated with site visits otherwise required to manage move-out/move-ins or to support prepayment programs.

Other smart grid capabilities that may be easily realized through the deployment of intelligent communications and AMI include improved outage management detection and restoration monitoring, revenue assurance and virtual metering of distribution assets.

CRITICAL ATTRIBUTES OF AMI SOLUTIONS

Modern communications network solutions leverage standards-based technology such as IEEE 802.15.4 to provide robust two-way wireless mesh network communications to intelligent devices. The intelligent communications platform should provide for remote firmware upgrades to connected intelligent devices and be capable of leveraging Internet protocol-based communications across multiple wide-area network (WAN) options (Figure 1).

Critical for maximizing the value of a communications infrastructure investment is support for broad interoperability and interconnectivity. Interoperability for AMI applications means supporting a range of options for metering devices. A communications platform system should be meter manufacturer-independent, empowering choice for utilities. This provides for current and future competitiveness for the meter itself, which is one of the more expensive elements of the smart metering solution.

Interconnectivity for communications platforms refers to the ability to support a broad range of functions, both end-point devices and systems at the head end. To support demand-side management and energy-efficiency initiatives, an intelligent communications platform should support programmable communicating thermostats (PCTs), in-home displays (IHDs) and load control switches.

The system may also support standards-based home-area networks (HANs) such as ZigBee and Zensys. Ultimately an intelligent communications platform should support a model whereby third-party manufacturers can develop solutions that operate on the network, providing competitive options for utilities.

For enterprise system interconnectivity, an AMI demand-side management or other smart grid head-end application should be developed using service-oriented architecture (SOA) principles and Web technologies. These applications should also support modern Web services-based solutions, providing published simple object access protocol (SOAP)-based APIs. This approach provides for easier integration with existing enterprise systems and simplifies the process of adding functionality (either through enhancements provided by the vendor or add-ons delivered by third parties or developed by the utility).

Finally, the value of an intelligent communications platform deployment is driven by the ability of other enterprise applications and processes to utilize the vast amount of new data received through the AMI , demand side management and smart grid applications. Core areas of extended value include integration with customer information systems and call center processes, and integration with outage management and work management systems. In addition, the intelligent communications platform makes utilities much better able to market new offerings to targeted customers based on their energy consumption profiles while also empowering consumers with new tools and access to information. The result: greater control over energy consumption costs and improved satisfaction.

INTEGRATION OF DISTRIBUTED GENERATION RESOURCES

Deployment and integration of distributed generation, including renewable resources, is an important supply-side element of the smart grid vision. This may include the installation of arrays of solar photovoltaic panels on home and office roofs, solar carports, small wind (3-5kvA) turbines, small biogas turbines and fuel cells.

By integrating these resources into a common communications platform, utilities have the opportunity to develop solutions that achieve much greater results than those provided simply by the sum of independent systems. For example, intelligent plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEvs) connected to a smart solar carport may choose when to purchase power for charging the car or even to sell power back to the grid in a vehicle-to-grid (v2G) model based on dynamic price signals received through the communications platform. By maintaining intelligence at the edge of the grid, consumers and distributed resource owners can be empowered to manage to their own benefits and the grid as a whole.

SUMMARY

Now is the time to embark on realizing the smart grid vision. Global warming and system reliability issues are driving a sense of urgency. An intelligent communications platform provides a foundation capable of supporting multiple devices in multiple environments – commercial, industrial and residential – working seamlessly together in a single unified network.

All of the technical assets of a smart grid can be managed holistically rather than as isolated or poorly connected parts. The power of a network grows geometrically according to the amount of resources and assets actively connected to it. This is the future of the smart grid, and it’s available today.

Smart Meters on a Roll in Canada

Electricity supply challenges in Ontario, Canada, have led the provincial government there to take aggressive action on both the supply and demand sides to meet customer electricity needs. Between now and 2025, it’s estimated that Ontario must build an almost entirely new electricity system – including replacing approximately 80 percent of current generating facilities (as they’re retired over time) and expanding the system to meet future growth. However, just as building new supply is vital, so too is conservation. That’s why Ontario’s provincial government is introducing new tools like smart meters to encourage electricity consumers to think more about how and when they use electricity. By implementing a smart metering infrastructure by 2010, the province hopes to provide a foundation for achieving a more than five percent reduction in provincial demand through load shifting, energy savings and price awareness.

Hydro One owns and operates one of the 10 largest transmission and distribution systems in North America, serving a geographic area of about 640,000 square kilometers. As the leading electricity transmitter and distributor in Ontario, the company supports the province’s goal of creating a conservation culture in Ontario and having a smart meter in every Ontario home and small business. The company’s allocation of the province’s target was 240,000 smart meters by 2007 and the full 1.3 million by 2010.

The task for Hydro One and other local distribution companies (LDCs) in the province is to meet the government time line while at the same time building an enabling solution that provides the most upside for operations, demand management and customer satisfaction. Working with the industry regulator and the LDCs, phased goals were established and allocated among the major utilities in the province.

ADVANCED METERING INFRASTRUCTURE AND SOLUTION ARCHITECTURE

Advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) is the term used to describe all of the hardware, software and connectivity required for a fully functioning smart metering system. To view AMI as just a technology to remotely read meters and bill customers, however, would be to miss the full potential of smart metering.

The core of the solution resides with the requirement for a ubiquitous communications network and an integration approach that provides for the exploitation of data from many types of devices (automated meter reading, load control, in-home displays, distribution monitoring and control and so on) by making it available to numerous enterprise applications (for example, customer information, outage management, asset management, geographic information and work execution systems).

To meet this requirement, the Hydro One team architected an end-to-end solution that rigorously sought open standards and the use of IP at all communications levels to ensure that the network and integration would be available to and compatible with numerous applications.

Hydro One’s AMI solution is based on standards (ANSI and IEEE) and open protocols (Zigbee and IP) to ensure maximum flexibility into the future as the technology and underlying applications such as in-home energy conservation devices (two-way real-time monitors, pool pump timers and so on) and various utility applications evolve.

Smart Meters

The “smarts” in any smart meter can be housed in virtually any meter platform. Meter reads are communicated at a frequency of 2.4 GHz by a radio housed under the meter’s glass. In essence, the hourly meter reads are transmitted by hopping from one meter to the next, forming a self-organizing network that culminates at the advanced meter regional collector (AMRC). This type of local area network, or LAN, is known as a mesh network and is known for its self-healing characteristics: if communication between meters is interrupted for any reason, communication paths between meters are automatically rerouted to the regional collector to ensure that data is delivered reliably and on time. The installed smart meters also have a “super capacitor,” enabling the meter to send a last communication to the utility when there has been a power outage.

Repeaters

Repeaters provide a wireless range extender for the meters and are used in less densely populated areas in the province to allow data to be transmitted from one meter to the next. Typically, repeaters are needed if the hop between meters is greater than 1 to 2 kilometers (depending on a number of factors, including terrain and ground cover).

Advanced Metering Regional Collectors

Typically installed on poles at preselected locations within a local area network, advanced metering regional collectors (AMRCs) gather the meter readings in a defined area. Most importantly, the AMRCs provide access to the wide area network (WAN), where data is sent wirelessly back to Hydro One. The AMI solution is designed to accommodate either wireless cellular or broadband WAN to backhaul hourly meter reads to the advanced metering control computer.

Advanced Metering Control Computer

The advanced metering control computer (AMCC) is used to retrieve and temporarily store meter reads from the regional collectors before they’re transmitted to the meter data management repository (discussed below). The information stored in the AMCC is available to log maintenance and data transmission faults, and to issue reports on the overall health of the AMI system.

Meter Data Management Repository

MDM/R is the acronym for the province-wide meter data management repository. The MDM/R provides a common infrastructure for receiving meter reads from all LDCs in Ontario, processing the reads to produce billing quality consumption data, and storing and managing the data. The Ontario government has entered into an agreement with the Independent Electricity System Operator to coordinate and manage implementation activities associated with the MDM/R.

Billing

Time-of-use “bucketed” data is sent from the MDM/R to Hydro One for any exception handling that may be required and for customer billing. Hydro One prepares the bill and sends it to the customer for payment.

Web Presentment of Customer Usage Data

Customer electricity usage data will be available to customers by 9 a.m. the day after they use it via a secure website. This data will be clearly marked as preliminary data until the customer has been billed.

GOALS, OBJECTIVES AND KEY ACCOMPLISHMENTS

To successfully deploy the smart metering solution described above, the Hydro One team set out to accomplish the following goals and objectives (which are enshrined in project governance plans and daily project activities):

  • Balance investment with the regulatory process to ensure that smart meter investments don’t get ahead of changes in regulatory requirements.
  • Design, test, prototype and pilot prior to buying or building – a rule that applies to all aspects of the smart meter solution architecture, from the meters and communication network to the back-office systems.
  • Delay building solution components until line-of-business requirements are locked down. Solution components that are unlikely to change will be built before other components to minimize the risk of rework.
  • Test smart meter deployment business processes, technology and customer experience throughout the process.
  • Ensure positive customer experience and value, including providing customers with information and tools to leverage smart meters in an appropriate time frame.
  • Use commercial, off-the-shelf (COTS) products where possible (as opposed to custom solutions).
  • Include estimation of total cost of ownership (one-time and ongoing costs) in architectural decision making.
  • Enable commencement of time-of-use (TOU) billing in 2009.

Key project accomplishments to date have included:

  • Building an in-situ lab using WiMax and meters in rural areas to test and confirm open protocols, wireless broadband interoperability, and meter performance;
  • Conducting a community rollout of about 15,000 meters to develop and successfully test and optimize meter change automation tools and customer communication processes;
  • Mass deploying of just over a quarter of a million meters across the province;
  • Designing and beginning to build the communication network to support the collection of hourly reads from approximately 1.3 million customers.

METER AND NETWORK DEPLOYMENT

Meter installation teams surpassed a notable milestone of 250,000 installed smart meters as of December 2007. Network deployment began in 2007 with a planned ramp-up in 2008 of installing more than 2,000 AMRCs province-wide.

Meeting these targets has required well-coordinated activities across the project team while working in parallel with external entities such as MeasurementCanada and others to ensure compliance with regulatory requirements.

Throughout meter and network deployment activities, Hydro One has adhered closely to three primary guiding principles, namely:

Safety. The following initiatives were factored into the project to help maintain a safe environment for all employees and business partners:

  • Internal training was integrated into the project from the inception, establishing a thorough yet common-sense compliant safety attitude throughout the team.
  • No employee is permitted to work on the project without a full safety refresher.
  • Safety represented a key element of incentive compensation for management and executive personnel.

Customer service. Given the opportunity to visit literally every customer, the success of this project is being judged daily by the manner in which the project team interacts with customers.

  • Every customer is provided with an information package within 15 to 30 days of the meter change.
  • Billing windows are scrupulously avoided through automation tools and integration to CIS in order to eliminate any disruption to the size, look and feel of the customer bill.
  • All customers receive a personal knock at the door before meter change.
  • All life-safety customers are changed by appointment or have positive contact made prior to meter change if they cannot be reached for an appointment

Productivity. Despite Hydro One’s rural footprint – which includes some areas so remote they must be accessed by all-terrain vehicle, boat or snowmobile – the installation teams maintain an average of 39.6 meters per installer-day with a peak of 97 per installer-day. They have achieved this through automation and a phased ramp-up of installers, including training and joint fieldwork with Hydro One’s partners.

IN-HOME CONSERVATION AND DEMAND MANAGEMENT

Testing will soon be underway using third-party devices for residential demand response programs that operate on the mesh network, including two-way realtime monitors, automated thermostats and load control devices. Optimally for customers, meters will serve as the key head-end device, connectable to numerous other devices within the home as illustrated in Figure 2.

While much of this technology is still in its infancy, North America-wide AMI deployments will rapidly accelerate resulting in greatly enhanced customer service opportunities going forward.

LEVERAGING THE SMART NETWORK TO INCREASE UTILITY EFFICIENCY

Hydro One is also looking ahead to applications that will leverage the smart metering communication network to increase the efficiency of its operations. As illustrated in Figure 3, these applications include distribution station monitoring, enhancements to outage management, safety monitoring, mobile work dispatch and work accomplishment, and asset security. All of the above applications have been tested in a proof-of-concept environment, and individual projects are planned to proceed on a business case basis.

Policy and Regulatory Initiatives And the Smart Grid

Public policy is commonly defined as a plan of action designed to guide decisions for achieving a targeted outcome. In the case of smart grids, new policies are needed if smart grids are actually to become a reality. This statement may sound dire, given the recent signing into law of the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act (EISA) in the United States. And in fact, work is underway in several countries to encourage smart grids and smart grid components such as smart metering. However, the risk still exists that unless stronger policies are enacted, grid modernization investments will fail to leverage the newer and better technologies now emerging, and smart grid efforts will never move beyond demonstration projects. This would be an unfortunate result when you consider the many benefits of a true smart grid: cost savings for the utility, reduced bills for customers, improved reliability and better environmental stewardship.

REGIONAL AND NATIONAL EFFORTS

As mentioned above, several regions are experimenting with smart grid provisions. At the national level, the U.S. federal government has enacted two pieces of legislation that support advanced metering and smart grids. The Energy Policy Act of 2005 directed U.S. utility regulators to consider time-of-use meters for their states. The 2007 EISA legislation has several provisions, including a list of smart grid goals to encourage two-way, real-time digital networks that stretch from a consumer’s home to the distribution network. The law also provides monies for regional demonstration projects and matching grants for smart grid investments. The EISA legislation also mandates the development of an “interoperability framework.”

In Europe, the European Union (E.U.) introduced a strategic energy technology plan in 2006 for the development of a smart electricity system over the next 30 years. The European Technology Platform organization includes representatives from industry, transmission and distribution system operators, research bodies and regulators. The organization has identified objectives and proposes a strategy to make the smart grid vision a reality.

Regionally, several U.S. states and Canadian provinces are focused on smart grid investments. In Canada, the Ontario Energy Board has mandated smart meters, with meter installation completion anticipated by 2010. In Texas, the Public Utilities Commission of Texas (PUCT) has finalized advanced metering legislation that authorizes metering cost recovery through surcharges. The PUCT also stipulated key components of an advanced metering system: two-way communications, time-date stamp, remote connect/disconnect, and access to consumer usage for both the consumer and the retail energy provider. The Massachusetts State Senate approved an energy bill that includes smart grid and time-of-use pricing. The bill requires that utilities submit a plan by Sept. 1, 2008, to the Massachusetts Public Utilities Commission, establishing a six-month pilot program for a smart grid. Most recently, California, Washington state and Maryland all introduced smart grid legislation.

AN ENCOMPASSING VISION

While these national and regional examples represent just a portion of the ongoing activity in this area, the issue remains that smart grid and advanced metering pilot programs do not guarantee a truly integrated, interoperable, scalable smart grid. Granted, a smart grid is not achieved overnight, but an encompassing smart grid vision should be in place as modernization and metering decisions are made, so that investment is consistent with the plan in mind. Obviously, challenges – such as financing, system integration and customer education – exist in moving from pilot to full grid deployment. However, many utility and regulatory personnel perceive these challenges to be ones of costs and technology readiness.

The costs are considerable. KEMA, the global energy consulting firm, estimates that the average cost of a smart meter project (representing just a portion of a smart grid project) is $775 million. The E.U.’s Strategic Energy Technology Plan estimates that the total smart grid investment required could be as much as $750 billion. These amounts are staggering when you consider that the market capitalization of all U.S. investor-owned electric utilities is roughly $550 billion. However, they’re not nearly as significant when you subtract the costs of fixing the grid using business-as-usual methods. Transmission and distribution expenditures are occurring with and without intelligence. The Energy Information Administration (EIA) estimates that between now and 2020 more than $200 billion will be spent to maintain and expand electricity transmission and distribution infrastructures in the United States alone.

Technology readiness will always be a concern in large system projects. Advances are being made in communication, sensor and security technologies, and IT. The Federal Communications Commission is pushing for auctions to accelerate adoption of different communication protocols. Price points are decreasing for pervasive cellular communication networks. Electric power equipment manufacturers are utilizing the new IEC 61850 standard to ensure interoperability among sensor devices. vendors are using approaches for security products that will enable north American Electric Reliability Corp. (nERC) and critical infrastructure protection (CIP) compliance.

In addition, IT providers are using event-driven architecture to ensure responsiveness to external events, rather than processing transactional events, and reaching new levels with high-speed computer analytics. leading service-oriented architecture companies are working with utilities to establish the underlying infrastructure critical to system integration. Finally, work is occurring in the standards community by the E.U., the Gridwise Architecture Council (GAC), Intelligrid, the national Energy Technology laboratory (nETl) and others to create frameworks for linking communication and electricity interoperability among devices, systems and data flows.

THE TIME IS NOW

These challenges should not halt progress – especially when one considers the societal benefits. Time stops for no one, and certainly in the case of the energy sector that statement could not be more accurate. Energy demand is increasing. The Energy Information Administration estimates that annual energy demand will increase roughly 50 percent over the next 25 years. Meanwhile, the debate over global warming seems to have waned. Few authorities are disputing the escalating concentrations of several greenhouse gases due to the burning of fossil fuels. The E.U. is attempting to decrease emissions through its 2006 Energy Efficiency directive. Many industry observers in the United States believe that there will likely be federal regulation of greenhouse gases within the next three years.

A smart grid would address many of these issues, giving options to the consumer to manage their usage and costs. By optimizing asset utilization, the smart grid will provide savings in that there is less need to build more power plants to meet increased electricity demand. As a self-healing grid that detects, responds and restores functions, the smart grid can greatly reduce the economic impact of blackout and power interruption grid failures.

A smart grid that provides the needed power quality can ensure the strong and resilient energy infrastructure necessary for the 21st-century economy. A smart grid also offers consumers options for managing their usage and costs. Further, a smart grid will enable plug-and-play integration of renewables, distributed resources and control systems. lastly, a smart grid will better enable plug-and-play integration of renewables, distributed resources and control systems.

INCENTIVES FOR MODERNIZATION

despite all of these potential benefits, more incentives are needed to drive grid modernization efforts. Several mechanisms are available to encourage investment. Some utilities are already using or evaluating alternative rate structures such as net metering and revenue decoupling to give utilities and consumer incentives to use less energy. net metering awards energy incentives or credit for consumer-based renewables. And revenue decoupling is a mechanism designed to eliminate or reduce dependence of a utility’s revenues on sales. Other programs – such as energy-efficiency or demand-reduction incentives – motivate consumers and businesses to adopt long-term energy-efficient behaviors (such as using programmable thermostats) and to consider energy efficiency when using appliances and computers, and even operating their homes.

Policy and regulatory strategy should incorporate these means and include others, such as accelerated depreciation and tax incentives. Accelerated depreciation encourages businesses to purchase new assets, since depreciation is steeper in the earlier years of the asset’s life and taxes are deferred to a later period. Tax incentives could be put in place for purchasing smart grid components. Utility Commissions could require utilities to consider all societal benefits, rather than just rate impacts, when crafting the business case. Utilities could take federal income tax credits for the investments. leaders could include smart grid technologies as a critical component of their overall energy policy.

Only when all of these policies and incentives are put in place will smart grids truly become a reality.

SmartGridNet Architecture for Utilities

With the accelerating movement toward distributed generation and the rapid shift in energy consumption patterns, today’s power utilities are facing growing requirements for improved management, capacity planning, control, security and administration of their infrastructure and services.

UTILITY NETWORK BUSINESS DRIVERS

These requirements are driving a need for greater automation and control throughout the power infrastructure, from generation through the customer site. In addition, utilities are interested in providing end-customers with new applications, such as advanced metering infrastructure (AMI), online usage reports and outage status. In addition to meeting these requirements, utilities are under pressure to reduce costs and automate operations, as well as protect their infrastructures from service disruption in compliance with homeland security requirements.

To succeed, utilities must seamlessly support these demands with an embedded infrastructure of traditional devices and technologies. This will allow them to provide a smooth evolution to next-generation capabilities, manage life cycle issues for aging equipment and devices, maintain service continuity, minimize capital investment, and ensure scalability and future-proofing for new applications, such as smart metering.

By adopting an evolutionary approach to an intelligent communications network (SmartGridNet), utilities can maximize their ability to leverage the existing asset base and minimize capital and operations expenses.

THE NEED FOR AN INTELLIGENT UTILITY NETWORK

As a first step toward implementing a SmartGridNet, utilities must implement intelligent electronic devices (IEDs) throughout the infrastructure – from generation and transmission through distribution directly to customer premises – if they are to effectively monitor and manage facilities, load and usage. A sophisticated operational communications network then interconnects such devices through control centers, providing support for supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA), teleprotection, remote meter reading, and operational voice and video. This network also enables new applications such as field personnel management and dispatch, safety and localization. In addition, the utility’s corporate communications network increases employee productivity and improves customer service by providing multimedia; voice, video, and data communications; worker mobility; and contact center capabilities.

These two network types – operational and corporate – and the applications they support may leverage common network facilities; however, they have very different requirements for availability, service assurance, bandwidth, security and performance.

SMARTGRIDNET REQUIREMENTS

Network technology is critical to the evolution of the next-generation utility. The SmartGridNet must support the following key requirements:

  • Virtualization. Enables operation of multiple virtual networks over common infrastructure and facilities while maintaining mutual isolation and distinct levels of service.
  • Quality of service (QoS). Allows priority treatment of critical traffic on a “per-network, per-service, per-user basis.”
  • High availability. Ensures constant availability of critical communications, transparent restoration and “always on” service – even when the public switched telephony network (PSTN) or local power supply suffers outages.
  • Multipoint-to-multipoint communications. Provides integrated control and data collection across multiple sensors and regulators via synchronized, redundant control centers for disaster recovery.
  • Two-way communications. Supports increasingly sophisticated interactions between control centers and end-customers or field forces to enable new capabilities, such as customer sellback, return or credit allocation for locally stored power; improved field service dispatch; information sharing; and reporting.
  • Mobile services. Improves employee efficiency, both within company facilities and in the field.
  • Security. Protects the infrastructure from malicious and inadvertent compromise from both internal and external sources, ensures service reliability and continuity, and complies with critical security regulations such as North American Electric Reliability Corp. (NERC).
  • Legacy service integration. Accommodates the continued presence of legacy remote terminal units (RTUs), meters, sensors and regulators, supporting circuit, X.25, frame relay (FR), and asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) interfaces and communications.
  • Future-proofing. Capability and scalability to meet not just today’s applications, but tomorrow’s, as driven by regulatory requirements (such as smart metering) and new revenue opportunities, such as utility delivery of business and residential telecommunications (U-Telco) services.

SMARTGRIDNET EVOLUTION

A number of network technologies – both wire-line and wireless – work together to achieve these requirements in a SmartGridNet. Utilities must leverage a range of network integration disciplines to engineer a smooth transformation of their existing infrastructure to a SmartGridNet.

The remainder of this paper describes an evolutionary scenario, in which:

  • Next-generation synchronous optical network (SONET)-based multiservice provisioning platforms (MSPPs), with native QoS-enabled Ethernet capabilities are seamlessly introduced at the transport layer to switch traffic from both embedded sensors and next-generation IEDs.
  • Cost-effective wave division multiplexing (WDM) is used to increase communications network capacity for new traffic while leveraging embedded fiber assets.
  • Multiprotocol label switching (MPLS)/ IP routing infrastructure is introduced as an overlay on the transport layer only for traffic requiring higher-layer services that cannot be addressed more efficiently by the transport layer MSPPs.
  • Circuit emulation over IP virtual private networks (VPNs) is supported as a means for carrying sensor traffic over shared or leased network facilities.
  • A variety of communications applications are delivered over this integrated infrastructure to enhance operational efficiency, reliability, employee productivity and customer satisfaction.
  • A toolbox of access technologies is appropriately applied, per specific area characteristics and requirements, to extend power service monitoring and management all the way to the end-customer’s premises.
  • A smart home network offers new capabilities to the end-customer, such as Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI), appliance control and flexible billing models.
  • Managed and assured availability, security, performance and regulatory compliance of the communications network.

THE SMARTGRIDNET ARCHITECTURE

Figure 1 provides an architectural framework that we may use to illustrate and map the relevant communications technologies and protocols.

The backbone network in Figure 1 interconnects corporate sites and data centers, control centers, generation facilities, transmission and distribution substations, and other core facilities. It can isolate the distinct operational and corporate communications networks and subnetworks while enforcing the critical network requirements outlined in the section above.

The underlying transport network for this intelligent backbone is made up of both fiber and wireless (for example, microwave) technologies. The backbone also employs ring and mesh architectures to provide high availability and rapid restoration.

INTELLIGENT CORE TRANSPORT

As alluring as pure packet networks may be, synchronous SONET remains a key technology for operational backbones. Only SONET can support the range of new and legacy traffic types while meeting the stringent absolute delay, differential delay and 50-millisecond restoration requirements of real-time traffic.

SONET transport for legacy traffic may be provided in MSPPs, which interoperate with embedded SONET elements to implement ring and mesh protection over fiber facilities and time division multiplexing (TDM)-based microwave. Full-featured Ethernet switch modules in these MSPPs enable next-generation traffic via Ethernet over SONET (EOS) and/or packet over SONET (POS). Appropriate, cost-effective wave division multiplexing (WDM) solutions – for example, coarse, passive and dense WDM – may also be applied to guarantee sufficient capacity while leveraging existing fiber assets.

BACKBONE SWITCHING/ROUTING

From a switching and routing perspective, a significant amount of traffic in the backbone may be managed at the transport layer – for example, via QoS-enabled Ethernet switching capabilities embedded in the SONET-based MSPPs. This is a key capability for supporting expedited delivery of critical traffic types, enabling utilities to migrate to more generic object-oriented substation event (GOOSE)-based inter-substation communications for SCADA and teleprotection in the future in accordance with standards such as IEC 61850.

Where higher-layer services – for example, IP VPN, multicast, ATM and FR – are required, however, utilities can introduce a multi-service switching/routing infrastructure incrementally on top of the transport infrastructure. The switching infrastructure is based on multi-protocol label switching (MPLS), implementing Layer 2 transport encapsulation and/or IP VPNs, per the relevant Internet engineering task force (IETF) requests for comments (RFCs).

This type of unified infrastructure reduces operations costs by sharing switching and restoration capabilities across multiple services. Current IP/MPLS switching technology is consistent with the network requirements summarized above for service traffic requiring higher-layer services, and may be combined with additional advanced services such as Layer 3 VPNs and unified threat management (UTM) devices/firewalls for further protection and isolation of traffic.

CORE COMMUNICATIONS APPLICATIONS

Operational services such as tele-protection and SCADA represent key categories of applications driving the requirements for a robust, secure, cost-effective network as described. Beyond these, there are a number of communications applications enabling improved operational efficiency for the utility, as well as mechanisms to enhance employee productivity and customer service. These include, but are not limited to:

  • Active network controls. Improves capacity and utilization of the electricity network.
  • Voice over IP (VoIP). Leverages common network infrastructure to reduce the cost of operational and corporate voice communications – for example, eliminating costly channel banks for individual lines required at remote substations.
  • Closed circuit TV (CCTV)/Video Over IP. Improves surveillance of remote assets and secure automated facilities.
  • Multimedia collaboration. Combines voice, video and data traffic in a rich application suite to enhance communication and worker productivity, giving employees direct access to centralized expertise and online resources (for example, standards and diagrams).
  • IED interconnection. Better measures and manages the electricity networks.
  • Mobility. Leverages in-plant and field worker mobility – via cellular, land mobile radio (LMR) and WiFi – to improve efficiency of key work processes.
  • Contact center. Employs next-generation communications and best-in-class customer service business processes to improve customer satisfaction.

DISTRIBUTION AND ACCESS NETWORKS

The intelligent utility distribution and access networks are subtending networks from the backbone, accommodating traffic between backbone switches/applications and devices in the distribution infrastructure all the way to the customer premises. IEDs on customer premises include automated meters and device regulators to detect and manage customer power usage.

These new devices are primarily packet-based. They may, therefore, be best supported by packet-based access network technologies. However, for select rings, TDM may also be chosen, as warranted. The packet-based access network technology chosen depends on the specifics of the sites to be connected and the economics associated with that area (for example, right of way, customer densities and embedded infrastructure).

Regardless of the access and last-mile network designs, traffic ultimately arrives at the network via an IP/MPLS edge switch/router with connectivity to the backbone IP/MPLS infrastructure. This switching/routing infrastructure ensures connectivity among the intelligent edge devices, core capabilities and control applications.

THE SMART HOME NETWORK

A futuristic home can support many remotely controlled and managed appliances centered on lifestyle improvements of security, entertainment, health and comfort (see Figure 2). In such a home, applications like smart meters and appliance control could be provided by application service providers (ASPs) (such as smart meter operators or utilities), using a home service manager and appropriate service gateways. This architecture differentiates between the access provider – that is, the utility/U-Telco or other public carrier – and the multiple ASPs who may provide applications to a home via the access provider.

FLEXIBLE CHARGING

By employing smart meters and developing the ability to retrieve electricity usage data at regular intervals – potentially several readings per hour – retailers could make billing a significant competitive differentiator. detailed usage information has already enabled value-added billing in the telecommunications world, and AMI can do likewise for billing electricity services. In time, electricity users will come to expect the same degree of flexible charging with their electricity bill that they already experience with their telephone bills, including, for example, prepaid and post-paid options, tariff in function of time, automated billing for house rental (vacation), family or group tariffs, budget tariffs and messaging.

MANAGING THE COMMUNICATIONS NETWORK

For utilities to leverage the communications network described above to meet business key requirements, they must intelligently manage that network’s facilities and services. This includes:

  • Configuration management. Provisioning services to ensure that underlying switching/routing and transport requirements are met.
  • Fault and performance management. Monitoring, correlating and isolating fault and performance data so that proactive, preventative and reactive corrective actions can be initiated.
  • Maintenance management. Planning of maintenance activities, including material management and logistics, and geographic information management.
  • Restoration management. Creating trouble tickets, dispatching and managing the workforce, and carrying out associated tracking and reporting.
  • Security management. Assuring the security of the infrastructure, managing access to authorized users, responding to security events, and identifying and remediating vulnerabilities per key security requirements such as NERC.

Utilities can integrate these capabilities into their existing network management infrastructures, or they can fully or partially outsource them to managed network service providers.

Figure 3 shows how key technologies are mapped to the architectural framework described previously. Being able to evolve into an intelligent utilities network in a cost-effective manner requires trusted support throughout planning, design, deployment, operations and maintenance.

CONCLUSION

Utilities can evolve their existing infrastructures to meet key SmartGridnet requirements by effectively leveraging a range of technologies and approaches. Through careful planning, designing, engineering and application of this technology, such firms may achieve the business objectives of SmartGridnet while protecting their current investments in infrastructure. Ultimately, by taking an evolutionary approach to SmartGridnet, utilities can maximize their ability to leverage the existing asset base as well as minimize capital and operations expenses.

Trilliant: Advanced Metering Infrastructure Solutions for Utilities and Green Energy Markets

Trilliant Incorporated provides wireless network solutions and software for advanced metering, demand response, smart grid and submetering. With more than 20 years’ experience solving utility meter communications needs, the company empowers flexibility and choice through the adoption and integration of open standards-based technologies.

ADVANCED METERING

Trilliant SecureMesh™ AMI solutions enable utilities to introduce services and programs such as time-of-use (TOU) metering, CIS initiated real-time meter reads and customer disconnect/ reconnect. These programs are transforming the traditional customer-utility relationship through interval-based consumption data and two-way messaging, resulting in reduced operational costs and improved reliability.

DEMAND RESPONSE

Many utilities are initiating smart metering and AMI programs with a primary goal of ad dressing critical peak demand challenges using TOU pricing, critical peak pricing and demand response programs. Trilliant is the first AMI supplier to provide an open standards-based platform for AMI-integrated demand response (i.e., load control) incorporating smart thermostats – and thus air conditioning equipment – and other loads such as pool pumps and water heaters. The Trilliant Demand Response solution also supports in-premise (“in-home”) displays that offer consumers real-time information on energy usage and utility-initiated messages.

SMART GRID

By leveraging Smart Grid solutions from Trilliant, utilities can realize dramatic improvements in system performance and cost. System operational challenges such as outage detection and restoration verification are supported through a combination of network-based intelligence and operations center applications. Trilliant’s Smart Grid solutions enable operations to more effectively identify faults and rapidly restore service on the basis of real-time readings of on-premise conditions. These offerings may also be integrated with extended enterprise systems supporting the mobile field force. Smart Grid solutions from Trilliant provide the foundation for advanced applications such as utility asset life cycle management and others that can benefit from the use of actual loading data.

SUBMETERING

Trilliant Energy Services offerings include turnkey submetering solutions, utility data profiling and online presentment to meet the needs of electric and natural gas utilities. Because Trilliant is an expert in energy technology the company’s solutions offer benefits to all stakeholders – from condo developers and corporations to owners and managers and directly to residential suite owners.

Customer Service in the Brave New World of Today’s Utilities

A NEW GENERATION OF CUSTOMER

Today’s utility customers are energy dependant, information driven, technologically advanced, willing to change and environmentally friendly. Their grandparents prompted utilities to develop and offer levelized billing, and their parents created the need for online bill presentment and credit card payment. This new generation of customer is about to usher in a brave new world of utility customer service in which the real-time utility will conduct business 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, and Internet-savvy consumers will have all the capabilities of the current customer service representative. They’ll be able to receive pricing signals and control their utility usage via Internet portals, as well as shop among utilities for the best price and switch providers.

Expectations of system reliability are high today. Ten years ago, when the customer called to let you know their power was out, the call took 20 seconds; today, they expect you to already know that their power is out and be able to provide additional information about the nature and duration of that outage. What’s wrong? Are crews on the way? What’s the ETR? Can you text me when it’s back on? The call that includes these questions (and more) takes three times as long as that phone call 10 years ago. Thankfully, utility technology is coming of age just in time to meet the needs of evolving utility customers.

Many utilities already use automated circuit switchers to monitor lines for potential fault conditions and to react in real time to isolate faults and restore power. Automated metering systems send out “last gasp” outage notifications to outage management systems to predict the location of a problem for quicker restoration of service. Two-way communications systems send signals to smart appliances, system monitoring devices and customer messaging orbs to affect customer usage patterns. Fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) and wireless systems communicate meter usage in near real time to enable monitoring for abnormal consumption patterns. If customers have all of this data at their fingertips, what more will they expect from their utility service professionals? Advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) and two-way communications between customer and utility provider are essential to the future of these innovations. Figure 1 indicates the penetration of advanced metering by region.

A TOUCH OF ORWELL

This brave new world is not without risk. Tremendous amounts of data will be acquired and maintained. Monthly usage habits of consumers can provide incredible insight into customers’ lives – imagine the knowledge that real-time data can provide. As marketers begin to understand the powerful communications channels utilities possess, partnerships will emerge to maximize their value. Privacy laws and regulations defining proper use and misuse of data similar to Customer Private Network Information (CPNI) legislation will emerge just as they did in the telecommunications industry. Thus, it would be wise for the utility industry to take steps to limit use prior to legislative mandates being enacted that would create barriers to practical use.

EMERGING BUSINESSES CREATING VALUE FOR CUSTOMERS

Many of the technologies discussed in this paper already exist; the future will simply make their application more common – the interesting part will come in seeing how these products and services are bundled and who will provide them. Over the next 10 years, many new services (and a few new spins on old ones) will be offered to the consumer via this new infrastructure. The array of service offerings will be as broad as the capabilities that are created through the utilities infrastructure design. Utilities offering only one-way communication from the meter will be limited, while utilities with two-way communication riding their own fiber-optic systems will find a vast number of opportunities. Some of these services will fall within the core competency of the utility and be a natural fit in creating new revenue streams; others will require new partnerships to enable their existence. Some will span residential, commercial and industrial market segments, while others will be tailored to the residential customer only.

Energy management and consulting services will flourish during the initial period, especially in areas where time-of-use rates are incorporated in all market segments. Cable, Internet, telephone and security services will consolidate in areas where fiber-to-the-home is part of the infrastructure. Utilities’ ability to provide these services may be greatly effected by their legal and regulatory structures. Where limitations are imposed related to scope and type of services, partnerships will be formed to enable cost-effective service. Figure 2 shows what utilities reported to be the most common AMI system usages in a recent Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) survey.

As shown in Figure 2, load control, demand response monitoring and notification of price changes are already a part of the system capabilities. As an awareness of energy efficiency develops, a new focus on conservation will give rise to a newfound interest in smart appliances. Their operational characteristics will be more sophisticated than the predecessors of the “cycle and save” era, and they will meet customers’ demand for energy savings and environmental friendliness. This will not be limited to water heaters and heating, venting and air-conditioning (HVAC) units. The new initiatives will encompass refrigerators, freezers, washers, dryers and other second-order appliances, driving conservation derived from time-of-day use to a new level. And these initiatives will not be limited to electricity.

IMPACTS OF TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE ON OTHER UTILITIES

Very few utility services will be exempt from the impact of changes in the electric industry. Natural gas and water usage, too, will be impacted as the nation focuses its attention on the efficient use of resources. Natural gas time-of-use rates will rise along with interruptible rates for residential consumers. This may take 10 to 15 years to occur, and a declining usage trend will need to be reversed; however, the same infrastructure restraints and concerns that plague the electric industry will be recognized in the natural gas industry as well. Thus, we can expect energy providers to adopt these rates in the future to stay competitive. If the electric systems are able to shift peak usage and levelize loads, the need for natural gas-fired generation will diminish. Natural gas-fired generation plants for system peaking would become unnecessary, and the decrease in demand would assist in stabilizing natural gas pricing.

Water availability issues are no longer limited to the Western United States, with areas such as Atlanta now beginning to experience water shortages as well. As a result, reverse-step rates that encourage water usage are being replaced with fixed and progressive step-rate structures to encourage water conservation. Automated metering can assist in eliminating waste, identifying excessive use during curtailment periods and creating a more efficient water distribution system. As energy time-of-use rates are implemented, water and wastewater treatment plants may find efficiencies in offering time-of-use rates as well in order to shape the usage characteristics of their customers without adding increased facilities. Even if this does not occur, time-of-use shifting of electrical load will have an impact on water usage patterns and effectively change water and wastewater operational characteristics.

In a world of increasing environmental vulnerability, the ability to monitor backflow in water metering will be essential in our efforts to be environmentally safe and monitor domestic threats to the water supply. Although technology’s ability to identify such threats will not prevent their occurrence, it will help utilities evaluate events and respond in order to isolate and diminish possible future threats.

IMPLICATIONS FOR UTILITIES

The above-described technological innovations don’t come without an impact to the service side of utilities. It will be difficult at best for utilities to modify legacy systems to take advantage of the benefits found in new technologies. More robust computer systems implemented in preparation for Y2K will be capable of some modifications; however, new software offerings are being designed today to address the vast opportunities that will soon exist. Processes for data management, storage and retrieval and use will need to be developed. And a new breed of customer service representative will begin to evolve. New technologies, near realtime information available to the consumer, unique customer and appliance configurations, and partnerships and services that go beyond the core competencies of the current workforce will create a short-term gap in trained customer service professionals. Billing departments will expand as rates become more complex. And the increased flexibility of customer information systems will require extensive checks and verifications to ensure accuracy.

Figure 3 (created by Robert Pratt of Pacific Northwest National Laboratory) provides a picture of the new landscape being created by the technologies utilities are implementing and the implications they have for customers.

Utilities with completely integrated systems will be the biggest winners in the future. Network management; geographic information systems; customer information systems; work order systems; supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems; and financial systems that communicate openly will be positioned to recognize the early wins that will spark the next decade of innovation. Cost-to-serve models continue to resonate as a popular topic among utility providers, and the impact of new technology will assist in making this integral to financial success.

The processes underlying current policies and procedures were designed for the way utilities traditionally operated – which is precisely why today’s utilities must take a systematic approach to re-evaluating their business processes if they’re to take advantage of new technology. They’ll even need to consider the cost of providing a detailed bill and mail delivery. The existence of real-time readings may bring dramatic changes in payment processing. Prepay accounts may eliminate the need to require deposits or assume risk for uncollectible accounts. Daily, weekly and semi-monthly payments may bring added cost (as may allowing customers to choose their due dates in the traditional arrears billing model); thus, utilities must consider the implications of these actions on cash fl ow and risk before implementing them. Advance notice of service interruption due to planned maintenance or construction can be communicated electronically over two-way automated meter reading (AMR) systems to orbs, communication panels, computers or other means. These same capabilities will dramatically change credit and collections efforts over the next 10 years. Electronic notification of past due accounts, shut-off and reconnection can all be done remotely at little cost to the utility.

IMPLICATIONS FOR CONSUMERS

Customers and commercial marketing efforts will be the driving forces for much of the innovation we’ll witness in coming years. No longer are customers simply comparing utilities against each other; today, they’re comparing utility customer service with their best and worst customer experiences regardless of industry. This means that customers are comparing a utility’s website capabilities with Amazon. com and its service response with the Ritz Carlton, Holiday Inn or Marriott they might frequent. Service reliability is measured against FedEx. Customer service expectations are raised with every initiative of competitive enterprise – a fact utilities will have to come to terms with if they’re to succeed.

All customers are not created equal. Technologically advanced customers will find the future exciting, while customers who view their utility as just another service provider will find it complicated and at times overwhelming. Utilities must communicate with customers at all levels to adequately prepare them for a future that’s already arrived.

How Intelligent Is Your Grid?

Many people in the utility industry see the intelligent grid — an electric transmission and distribution network that uses information technology to predict and adjust to network changes — as a long-term goal that utilities are still far from achieving. Energy Insights research, however, indicates that today’s grid is more intelligent than people think. In fact, utilities can begin having the network of the future today by better leveraging their existing resources and focusing on the intelligent-grid backbone.

DRIVERS FOR THE INTELLIGENT GRID

Before discussing the intelligent grid backbone, it’s important to understand the drivers directing the intelligent grid’s progress. While many groups — such as government, utilities and technology companies — may be pushing the intelligent grid forward, they are also slowing it down. Here’s how:

  • Government. With the 2005 U.S. Energy Policy Act and the more recent 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act, the federal government has acknowledged the intelligent grid’s importance and is supporting investment in the area. Furthermore, public utility commissions (PUCs) have begun supporting intelligent grid investments like smart metering. At the same time, however, PUCs have a duty to maintain reasonable prices. Since utilities have not extensively tested the benefits of some intelligent grid technologies, such as distribution line sensors, many regulators hesitate to support utilities investing in intelligent grid technologies beyond smart metering.
  • Utilities. Energy Insights research indicates that information technology, in general, enables utilities to increase operational efficiency and reduce costs. For this reason, utilities are open to information technology; however, they’re often looking for quick cost recovery and benefits. Many intelligent grid technologies provide longer-term benefits, making them difficult to cost-justify over the short term. Since utilities are risk-aware, this can make intelligent grid investments look riskier than traditional information technology investments.
  • Technology. Although advanced enough to function on the grid today, many intelligent grid technologies could become quickly outdated thanks to the rapidly developing marketplace. What’s more, the life span of many intelligent grid technologies is not as long as those of traditional grid assets. For example, a smart meter’s typical life span is about 10 to 15 years, compared with 20 to 30 years for an electro-mechanical meter.

With strong drivers and competing pressures like these, it’s not a question of whether the intelligent grid will happen but when utilities will implement new technologies. Given the challenges facing the intelligent grid, the transition will likely be more of an evolution than a revolution. As a result, utilities are making their grids more intelligent today by focusing on the basics, or the intelligent grid backbone.

THE INTELLIGENT GRID BACKBONE

What comprises this backbone? Answering this question requires a closer look at how intelligence changes the grid. Typically, a utility has good visibility into the operation of its generation and transmission infrastructure but poor visibility into its distribution network. As a result, the utility must respond to a changing distribution network based on very limited information. Furthermore, if a grid event requires attention — such as in the case of a transformer failure — people must review information, decide to act and then manually dispatch field crews. This type of approach translates to slower, less informed reactions to grid events.

The intelligent grid changes these reactions through a backbone of technologies — sensors, communication networks and advanced analytics — especially developed for distribution networks. To better understand these changes, we can imagine a scenario where a utility has an outage on its distribution network. As shown in Figure 1, additional grid sensors collect more information, making it easier to detect problems. Communications networks then allow sensors to convey the problem to the utility. Advanced analytics can efficiently process this information and determine more precisely where the fault is located, as well as automatically respond to the problem and dispatch field crews. These components not only enable faster, better-informed reactions to grid problems, they can also do real-time pricing, improve demand response and better handle distributed and renewable energy sources.

A CLOSER LOOK AT BACKBONE COMPONENTS

A deeper dive into each of these intelligent grid backbone technologies reveals how utilities are gaining more intelligence about their grid today.

Network sensors are important not only for real-time operations — such as locating faults and connecting distributed energy sources to the grid — but also for providing a rich historical data source to improve asset maintenance and load research and forecasting. Today, more utilities are using sensors to better monitor their distribution networks; however, they’re focused primarily on smart meters. The reason for this is that smart meters have immediate operational benefits that make them attractive for many utilities today, including reducing meter reader costs, offering accurate billing information, providing theft control and satisfying regulatory requirements. Yet this focus on smart meters has created a monitoring gap between the transmission network and the smart meter.

A slew of sensors are available from companies such as General Electric, ABB, PowerSense, GridSense and Serveron to fill this monitoring gap. Tracking everything from load balancing and transformer status to circuit breakers and tap changers, energized downed lines, high-impedance faults and stray voltage, and more, these sensors are able to fill the monitoring gap, yet utilities hesitate to invest in them because they lack the immediate operational benefits of smart meters.

By monitoring this gap, however, utilities will sustain longer-term grid benefits such as reduced generation capacity building. Utilities have found they can begin monitoring this gap by:

  • Prioritizing sensor investments. Customer complaints and regulatory pressure have pushed some utilities to take action for particular parts of their service territory. For example, one utility Energy Insights studied received numerous customer complaints about a particular feeder’s reliability, so the utility invested in line sensors for that area. Another utility began considering sensor investments in troubled areas of its distribution network when regulators demanded that the utility raise its System Average Interruption Frequency Index (SAIFI) and System Average Interruption Duration Index (SAIDI) ratings from the bottom 50 percent to the top 25 percent of benchmarked utilities. By focusing on such areas, utilities can achieve “quick wins” with sensors and build utility confidence by using additional sensors on their distribution grid.
  • Realizing it’s all about compromise. Even in high-priority areas, it may not make financial sense for a utility to deploy the full range of sensors for every possible asset. In some situations, utilities may target a particular area of the service territory with a higher density of sensors. For example, a large U.S. investor-owned utility with a medium voltage-sensing program placed a high density of sensors along a specific section of its service territory. On the other hand, utilities might cover a broader area of service territory with fewer sensors, similar to the approach taken by a large investor-owned utility Energy Insights looked at that monitored only transformers across its service territory.
  • Rolling in sensors with other intelligent grid initiatives. Some utilities find ways to combine their smart metering projects with other distribution network sensors or to leverage existing investments that could support additional sensors. One utility that Energy Insights looked at installed transformer sensors along with a smart meter initiative and leveraged the communications networks it used for smart metering.

While sensors provide an important means of capturing information about the grid, communication networks are critical to moving that information throughout the intelligent grid — whether between sensors or field crews. Typically, to enable intelligent grid communications, utilities must either build new communications networks to bring intelligence to the existing grid or incorporate communication networks into new construction. Yet utilities today are also leveraging existing or recently installed communications networks to facilitate more sophisticated intelligent grid initiatives such as the following:

  • Smart metering and automated meter-reading (AMR) initiatives. With the current drive to install smart meters, many utilities are covering their distribution networks with communications infrastructure. Furthermore, existing AMR deployments may include communications networks that can bring data back to the utility. Some utilities are taking advantage of these networks to begin plugging other sensors into their distribution networks.
  • Mobile workforce. The deployment of mobile technologies for field crews is another hot area for utilities right now. Utilities are deploying cellular networks for field crew communications for voice and data. Although utilities have typically been hesitant to work with third-party communications providers, they’ve become more comfortable with outside providers after using them for their mobile technologies. Since most of the cellular networks can provide data coverage as well, some utilities are beginning to use these providers to transmit sensor information across their distribution networks.

Since smart metering and mobile communications networks are already in place, the incremental cost of installing sensors on these networks is relatively low. The key is making sure that different sensors and components can plug into these networks easily (for example, using a standard communications protocol).

The last key piece of the intelligent grid backbone is advanced analytics. Utilities are required to make quick decisions every day if they’re to maintain a safe and reliable grid, and the key to making such decisions is being well informed. Intelligent grid analytics can help utilities quickly process large amounts of data from sensors so that they can make those informed decisions. However, how quickly a decision needs to be made depends on the situation. Intelligent grid analytics assist with two types of decisions: very quick decisions (veQuids) and quick decisions (Quids). veQuids are made in milliseconds by computers and intelligent devices analyzing complex, real-time data – an intelligent grid vision that’s still a future development for most utilities.

Fortunately, many proactive decisions about the grid don’t have to be made in milliseconds. Many utilities today can make Quids — often manual decisions — to predict and adjust to network changes within a time frame of minutes, days or even months.

no matter how quick the decision, however, all predictive efforts are based on access to good-quality data. In putting their Quid capabilities to use today — in particular for predictive maintenance and smart metering — utilities are building not only intelligence about their grids but also a foundation for providing more advanced veQuids analytics in the future through the following:

  • The information foundation. Smart metering and predictive maintenance require utilities to collect not only more data but also more real-time data. Smart metering also helps break down barriers between retail and operational data sources, which in turn creates better visibility across many data sources to provide a better understanding of a complex grid.
  • The automation transition. To make the leap between Quids and veQuids requires more than just better access to more information — it also requires automation. While fully automated decision-making is still a thing of the future, many utilities are taking steps to compile and display data automatically as well as do some basic analysis, using dashboards from providers such as OSIsoft and Obvient Strategies to display high-level information customized for individual users. The user then further analyzes the data, and makes decisions and takes action based on that analysis. Many utilities today use the dashboard model to monitor critical assets based on both real-time and historical data.

ENSURING A MORE INTELLIGENT GRID TODAY AND TOMORROW

As these backbone components show, utilities already have some intelligence on their grids. now, they’re building on that intelligence by leveraging existing infrastructure and resources — whether it’s voice communications providers for data transmission or Quid resources to build a foundation for the veQuids of tomorrow. In particular, utilities need to look at:

  • Scalability. Utilities need to make sure that whatever technologies they put on the grid today can grow to accommodate larger portions of the grid in future.
  • Flexibility. Given rapid technology changes in the marketplace, utilities need to make sure their technology is flexible and adaptable. For example, utilities should consider smart meters that have the ability to change out communications cards to allow for new technologies.
  • Integration. due to the evolutionary nature of the grid, and with so many intelligent grid components that must work together (intelligent sensors at substations, transformers and power lines; smart meters; and distributed and renewable energy sources), utilities need to make sure these disparate components can work with one another. Utilities need to consider how to introduce more flexibility into their intelligent grids to accommodate the increasingly complex network of devices.

As today’s utilities employ targeted efforts to build intelligence about the grid, they must keep in mind that whatever action they take today – no matter how small – must ultimately help them meet the demands of tomorrow.

The Distributed Utility of the (Near) Future

The next 10 to 15 years will see major changes – what future historians might even call upheavals – in the way electricity is distributed to businesses and households throughout the United States. The exact nature of these changes and their long-term effect on the security and economic well-being of this country are difficult to predict. However, a consensus already exists among those working within the industry – as well as with politicians and regulators, economists, environmentalists and (increasingly) the general public – that these fundamental changes are inevitable.

This need for change is in evidence everywhere across the country. The February 26, 2008, temporary blackout in Florida served as just another warning that the existing paradigm is failing. Although at the time of this writing, the exact cause of that blackout had not yet been identified, the incident serves as a reminder that the nationwide interconnected transmission and distribution grid is no longer stable. To wit: disturbances in Florida on that Tuesday were noted and measured as far away as New York.

A FAILING MODEL

The existing paradigm of nationwide grid interconnection brought about primarily by the deregulation movement of the late 1990s emphasizes that electricity be generated at large plants in various parts of the country and then distributed nationwide. There are two reasons this paradigm is failing. First, the transmission and distribution system wasn’t designed to serve as a nationwide grid; it is aged and only marginally stable. Second, political, regulatory and social forces are making the construction of large generating plants increasingly difficult, expensive and eventually unfeasible.

The previous historic paradigm made each utility primarily responsible for generation, transmission and distribution in its own service territory; this had the benefit of localizing disturbances and fragmenting responsibility and expense. With loose interconnections to other states and regions, a disturbance in one area or a lack of resources in a different one had considerably less effect on other parts of the country, or even other parts of service territories.

For better or worse, we now have a nationwide interconnected grid – albeit one that was neither designed for the purpose nor serves it adequately. Although the existing grid can be improved, the expense would be massive, and probably cost prohibitive. Knowledgeable industry insiders, in fact, calculate that it would cost more than the current market value of all U.S. utilities combined to modernize the nationwide grid and replace its large generating facilities over the next 30 years. Obviously, the paradigm is going to have to change.

While the need for dramatic change is clear, though, what’s less clear is the direction that change should take. And time is running short: North American Electric Reliability Corp. (NERC) projects serious shortages in the nation’s electric supply by 2016. Utilities recognize the need; they just aren’t sure which way to jump first.

With a number of tipping points already reached (and the changes they describe continuing to accelerate), it’s easy to envision the scenario that’s about to unfold. Consider the following:

  • The United States stands to face a serious supply/demand disconnect within 10 years. Unless something dramatic happens, there simply won’t be nearly enough electricity to go around. Already, some parts of the country are feeling the pinch. And regulatory and legislative uncertainty (especially around global warming and environmental issues) makes it difficult for utilities to know what to do. Building new generation of any type other than “green energy” is extremely difficult, and green energy – which currently meets less than 3 percent of U.S. supply needs – cannot close the growing gap between supply and demand being projected by NERC. Specifically, green energy will not be able to replace the 50 percent of U.S. electricity currently supplied by coal within that 10-year time frame.
  • Fuel prices continue to escalate, and the reliability of the fuel supply continues to decline. In addition, increasing restrictions are being placed on fuel selection, especially coal.
  • A generation of utility workers is nearing retirement, and finding adequate replacements among the younger generation is proving increasingly difficult.
  • It’s extremely difficult to site new transmission – needed to deal with supply-and-demand issues. Even new Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) authority to authorize corridors is being met with virulent opposition.

SMART GRID NO SILVER BULLET

Distributed generation – including many smaller supply sources to replace fewer large ones – and “smart grids” (designed to enhance delivery efficiency and effectiveness) have been posited as solutions. However, although such solutions offer potential, they’re far from being in place today. At best, smart grids and smarter consumers are only part of the answer. They will help reduce demand (though probably not enough to make up the generation shortfall), and they’re both still evolving as concepts. While most utility executives recognize the problems, they continue to be uncertain about the solutions and have a considerable distance to go before implementing any of them, according to recent Sierra Energy Group surveys.

According to these surveys, more than 90 percent of utility executives now feel that the intelligent utility enterprise and smart grid (IUE/SG) – that is, the distributed utility – represents an inevitable part of their future (Figure 1). This finding was true of all utility types supplying electricity.

Although utility executives understand the problem and the IUE/SG approach to solving part of it, they’re behind in planning on exactly how to implement the various pieces. That “planning lag” for the vision can be seen in Figure 2.

At least some fault for the planning lag can be attributed to forces outside the utilities. While politicians and regulators have been emphasizing conservation and demand response, they’ve failed to produce guidelines for how this will work. And although a number of states have established mandatory green power percentages, Congress failed to do the same in an Energy Policy Act (EPACT) adopted in December 2007. While the EPACT of 2005 “urged” regulators to “urge” utilities to install smart meters, it didn’t make their installation a requirement, and thus regulators have moved at different speeds in different parts of the country on this urging.

Although we’ve entered a new era, utilities remain burdened with the internal problems caused by the “silo mentality” left over from generations of tight regulatory control. Today, real-time data is often still jealously guarded in engineering and operations silos. However, a key component in the development of intelligent utilities will be pushing both real-time and back-office data onto dashboards so that executives can make real-time decisions.

Getting from where utilities were (and in many respects still are) in the last century to where they need to be by 2018 isn’t a problem that can be solved overnight. And, in fact, utilities have historically evolved slowly. Today’s executives know that technological evolution in the utility industry needs to accelerate rapidly, but they’re uncertain where to start. For example, should you install an advanced metering structure (AMI) as rapidly as possible? Do you emphasize automating the grid and adding artificial intelligence? Do you continue to build out mobile systems to push data (and more detailed, simpler instructions) to field crews who soon will be much younger and less experienced? Do you rush into home automation? Do you build windmills and solar farms? Utilities have neither the financial nor human resources to do everything at once.

THE DEMAND FOR AMI

Its name implies that a smart grid will become increasingly self-operating and self-healing – and indeed much of the technology for this type of intelligent network grid has been developed. It has not, however, been widely deployed. Utilities, in fact, have been working on basic distribution automation (DA) – the capability to operate the grid remotely – for a number of years.

As mentioned earlier, most theorists – not to mention politicians and regulators – feel that utilities will have to enable AMI and demand response/home automation if they’re to encourage energy conservation in an impending era of short supplies. While advanced meter reading (AMR) has been around for a long time, its penetration remains relatively small in the utilities industry – especially in the case of advanced AMI meters for enabling demand response: According to figures released by Sierra Energy Group and Newton-Evans Research Co., only 8 to 10 percent of this country’s utilities were using AMI meters by 2008.

That said, the push for AMI on the part of both EPACT 2005 and regulators is having an obvious effect. Numerous utilities (including companies like Entergy and Southern Co.) that previously refused to consider AMR now have AMI projects in progress. However, even though an anticipated building boom in AMI is finally underway, there’s still much to be done to enable the demand response that will be desperately needed by 2016.

THE AUTOMATED HOME

The final area we can expect the IUE/SG concept to envelope comes at the residential level. With residential home automation in place, utilities will be able to control usage directly – by adjusting thermostats or compressor cycling, or via other techniques. Again, the technology for this has existed for some time; however, there are very few installations nationwide. A number of experiments were conducted with home automation in the early- to mid-1990s, with some subdivisions even being built under the mantra of “demand-side management.”

Demand response – the term currently in vogue with politicians – may be considered more politically correct, but the net result is the same. Home automation will enable regulators, through utilities, to ration usage. Although politicians avoid using the word rationing, if global warming concerns continue to seriously impact utilities’ ability to access adequate generation, rationing will be the result – making direct load control at the residential level one of the most problematic issues in the distributed utility paradigm of the future. Are large numbers of Americans going to acquiesce calmly to their electrical supply being rationed? No one knows, but there seem to be few options.

GREEN PRESSURE AND THE TIPPING POINT

While much legitimate scientific debate remains about whether global warming is real and, if so, whether it’s a naturally occurring or man-made phenomenon (arising primarily from carbon dioxide emissions), that debate is diminishing among politicians at every level. The majority of politicians, in fact, have bought into the notion that carbon emissions from many sources – primarily the generation of electricity by burning coal – are the culprit.

Thus, despite continued scientific debate, the political tipping point has been reached, and U.S. politicians are making moves to force this country’s utility industry to adapt to a situation that may or may not be real. Whether or not it makes logical or economic sense, utilities are under increasing pressure to adopt the Intelligent Utility/Smart Grid/Home Automation/Demand Response model – a model that includes many small generation points to make up for fewer large plants. This political tipping point is also shutting down more proposed generation projects each month, adding to the likely shortage. Since 2000, approximately 50 percent of all proposed new coal-fired generation plants have been canceled, according to energy-industry adviser Wood McKenzie (Gas and Power Service Insight, February 2008).

In the distant future, as technology continues to advance, electric generation in the United States will likely include a mix of energy sources, many of them distributed and green. however, there’s no way that in the next 10 years – the window of greatest concern in the NERC projections on the generation and reliability side – green energy will be ready and available in sufficient quantities to forestall a significant electricity shortfall. Nuclear energy represents the only truly viable solution; however, ongoing opposition to this form of power generation makes it unlikely that sufficient nuclear energy will be available within this period. The already-lengthy licensing process (though streamlined somewhat of late by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission) is exacerbated by lawsuits and opposition every step of the way. In addition, most of the necessary engineering and manufacturing processes have been lost in the United States over the last 30 years – the time elapsed since the last U.S. nuclear last plant was built – making it necessary to reacquire that knowledge from abroad.

The NERC Reliability Report of Oct. 15, 2007, points strongly toward a significant shortfall of electricity within approximately 10 years – a situation that could lead to rolling blackouts and brownouts in parts of the country that have never experienced them before. It could also lead to mandatory “demand response” – in other words, rationing – at the residential level. This situation, however, is not inevitable: technology exists to prevent it (including nuclear and cleaner coal now as well as a gradual development of solar, biomass, sequestration and so on over time, with wind for peaking). But thanks to concern over global warming and other issues raised by the environmental community, many politicians and regulators have become convinced otherwise. And thus, they won’t consider a different tack to solving the problem until there’s a public outcry – and that’s not likely to occur for another 10 years, at which point the national economy and utilities may already have suffered tremendous (possibly irreparable) harm.

WHAT CAN BE DONE?

The problem the utilities industry faces today is neither economic nor technological – it’s ideological. The global warming alarmists are shutting down coal before sufficient economically viable replacements (with the possible exception of nuclear) are in place. And the rest of the options are tied up in court. (For example, the United States needs 45 liquefied natural gas plants to be converted to gas – a costly fuel with iffy reliability – but only five have been built; the rest are tied up in court.) As long as it’s possible to tie up nuclear applications for five to 10 years and shut down “clean coal” plants through the political process, the U.S. utility industry is left with few options.

So what are utilities to do? They must get much smarter (IUE/Sg), and they must prepare for rationing (AMI/demand response). As seen in SEG studies, utilities still have a ways to go in these areas, but at least this is a strategy that can (for the most part) be put in place within 10 to 15 years. The technology for IUE/Sg already exists; it’s relatively inexpensive (compared with large-scale green energy development and nuclear plant construction); and utilities can employ it with relatively little regulatory oversight. In fact, regulators are actually encouraging it.

For these reasons, IUE/SG represents a major bridge to a more stable future. Even if today’s apocalyptic scenarios fail to develop – that is, global warming is debunked, or new generation sources develop much more rapidly than expected – intelligent utilities with smart grids will remain a good idea. The paradigm is shifting as we watch – but will that shift be completed in time to prevent major economic and social dislocation? Fasten your seatbelts: the next 10 to 15 years should be very interesting!