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THE ANNUALTECH HEAD ISSUE
VOL 7, ISSUE 4 » WINTER 2015
®
AN ENERGY CENTRAL PUBLICATION
» WWW.INTELLIGENTUTILITY.COMPRSRT STDUS POSTAGE
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�COVER // WINTER 2015
Have you got the brains for this issue? Since it’s our annual #techHEAD issue, we couldn’t resist playing off the literal words for this cover. What can we say? We’re a playful, geeky bunch. Don’t believe us? Check out the infographic explaining grid evolution in emoji. (Techie stuff doesn’t have to be boring.)
FEATURES // OPERATIONAL PERSPECTIVES
8 Adecadeofchange+ Entergy weathers the storm
12Facingtheneedsofcriticalinfrastructurecommunications+ On strategies and spectrum
14 XcelEnergypowersupanoilboom+ Running electric transmission as a drilling
backbone
16 Mathematics,complexityandbridgebeams:talkingstructuralengineeringwithAustinEnergy+ A women-in-energy profile of Lora Teed
18Whatifyoucan’tbuildthatnewtransmissionline?+ Doing more with what you have
DEPARTMENTS
4 Drawing the line
6 Intelligentutility.com
22 Customer Focus
22 Avista’sProjectCompassgoeslive
+ CIS moves from divine design to reality road test
23 NationalGrid:theutilityalphawhenitcomesto
customerlistening + A chat with White & Reed
25 International
25 Asianmarketsseerapidtechgrowth
+ China in renewables, Japan in smart meters
27 Windturbinesontheworld’smosticonictower?
+ The Eiffel evolves
29 Sun,wind&electricitytheft
+ Smart grid trends in Latin America
32 IT Insights
32 ConEdisontalksdeath,dataanddisruptions
+ An interview with Matthew Ketschke
33 Directtalkfromthe
DHSoncybersecurity
+ An interview with the head of ICS-CERT
35 Theevolutionofthe
gridinemoji
36 Analytics
36 Thefutureofutilitydata
+ How do we get there?
37 Unlockingthenextgen
ofsmartgridbenefits
+ Here’s a hint: analytics involved
39 By the numbers
39 Catchingupwith
AnnePramaggiore
+ Talking with ComEd’s prez on derbys, details & the death spiral
40 Out the door
40 Amodelact
+ FirstEnergy lineman gets his own bobblehead
Vol.7,No.4,2015byEnergyCentral.Allrightsreserved.Permissiontoreprintorquoteexcerptsgrantedbywrittenrequestonly.Intelligent Utility®ispublishedquarterlybyEnergyCentral,2821S.ParkerRoad,Suite1105,Aurora,CO80014.Subscriptionsareavailablebyrequest.POSTMASTER:SendaddresschangestoIntelligent Utility,2821S.ParkerRoad,Suite1105,Aurora,CO80014.Customerservice:303.782.5510.ForchangeofaddressincludeoldaddressaswellasnewaddresswithbothZIPcodes.Allowfourtosixweeksforchangeofaddresstobecomeeffective.Pleaseincludecurrentmailinglabelwhenwritingaboutyoursubscription.
AN ENERGY CENTRAL PUBLICATION
CONTENTS
8
25
33
40
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Service Providers, are your customers’ asset experts
walking out the door?
www.osisoft.com
A Connected Services
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fill that void and:
Increase data visibility
Maintain intellectual property
Develop scalable solutions
Increase field force efficiency
Learn More:
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DRAWING THE LINE
Kathleen Wolf Davis
Editor-in-Chief, Intelligent Utility magazine [email protected]
WHEN I WAS A KID, I TALKED A LOT. Since I still talk a lot—since I’m still a storyteller whether
on paper for my job or out with friends for dinner—I’m sure that revelation is a surprise to no one. I doubt there’s anyone just confused by that statement.
Kids who talk grow up to be adults who talk. And nowhere is talking a better idea than in my
business. It’s my job to get people to talk to me—at conferences, on the phone, even via email these days. It’s a dawning digital age, and, honestly, that technology has allowed me to talk to more people more often. For my job, that’s a good thing. For my time management, perhaps not so much.
You’ll notice in this issue a lot of references to talking to utilities—from Austin Energy to ComEd to Con Edison to Entergy. It’s our annual #techHEAD issue, and the only way we’re going to find out how our industry is using all that shiny tech is to, well, talk to them.
Hence, the chattiness that abounds in these pages.If I’m honest with you, the techhead issue is always
my favorite. I get to talk about storms and recovery, hardware and software, and the people who fix it up and make it all work. I get to talk to the geeks, the grapplers and the guides. And it’s always a satisfying story.
And a talker like me, well, we’re always looking for a satisfying story.
So flip through these pages and enjoy the tales from utilities, the Department of Homeland Security, the Utility Telecom Council, analysts and engineers. And tell me how you liked these stories—or tell me your story—at our Twitter feed. You’ll find us @IntelUtil.
Talk,moretalk
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INTELLIGENTUTILITY .C0M
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EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Kathleen Wolf Davis
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FEATURE WRITERS
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Derek Handova, David Hudson, Brett Kilbourne,
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Brian Gilbert
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OPERATIONAL PERSPECTIVES
AUGUST 29TH WAS THE ANNIVERSARY of Hurricane Katrina hitting Southeast Louisiana.
For two or three days this year, there were live shots on every news channel from Fox to CBS. There were corre-spondents on the ground looking at new construction and remaining problems. But few, if any, told the story of this historic storm from local utility Entergy’s unique angle.
Katrina and Rita, another massive hurricane that slammed into tangential Gulf areas less than a month later, hit the regional power structure hard. It was dev-astating to Entergy, but they couldn’t dwell on that dev-
astation—nor could they really escape it, as many did. They had a job to do. They had to get the power back on. And no storm, no flooding, no lack of infrastructure was going to stop them.
For this special #techHEAD issue, we knew we wanted to highlight the massive, dangerous undertaking of recovery after Katrina to show how important planning and people are to the tech structure we all rely upon. So we sat down with Entergy’s Mike Vaughan, vice president of transmission asset management, and Dennis Dawsey, vice president of customer service for Louisiana.
Entergy weathers the stormBy Kathleen Wolf Davis
OF CHANGEA DECADE+
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OF CHANGEStorm surge
It was Vaughan who added Hurricane Rita to our discus-sion, saying that those two huge storms so close together just couldn’t be separated in their minds. It was a cyclical recov-ery effort first with Katrina and then with the second storm. It was as if they split off to cover all of Entergy’s territory. Katrina went for New Orleans and Southeast Louisiana, and Rita took on Southwest Louisiana and parts of Texas.
“We had about 1.1 million customers out with Katrina and about 800,000 out with Rita,” Vaughan said. “Two severe events only 26 days apart. We had never seen this situation before. We had never had this many customers out at once.”
But that massive undertaking didn’t cripple Entergy. They had planned for this.
“Our motto is to hope for the best but prepare for the worst,” Vaughan added. “Unfortunately, this situation was definitely the worst.”
Dawsey added that a few months before, the utility had gone through its annual planning and testing event for storm outages and they had modeled a hurricane hitting the mouth of the Mississippi—winds and tidal surges and all—and that’s exactly what they got less than four months later.
But they had a plan. Employees, from executives to customer reps to linemen, had assigned storm roles. (In the case of the linemen, that storm role would likely mirror their day jobs. In the case of the customer reps, that may be a vastly different role.)
And, despite the massive magnitude of what they were fac-ing, Entergy put that plan into action. Vaughan and Dawsey
A DECADE
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OPERATIONAL PERSPECTIVES
discussed how the magnitude of the damage inflicted was mirrored in the magnitude of the recovery effort required: over 10,000 workers and 3,000 support personnel for Katrina response alone; help from 29 states across America; require-ments to evacuate the company’s headquarters and satellite offices and branches, including equipment.
That was a challenge in itself, but, unlike other storms, there were organizational problems underlying this mas-sive effort.
“We had 15,000 people and no hotels for them. The hotels were damaged or destroyed,” Vaughan said. “We had 15,000 people and no food for them. The restaurants were closed or missing. There were no hospitals. There was no gas for the equipment.”
So they brought in bunk trailers. They set up “man camps.” They trucked in every service they could think of from food to sanitation to a laundry, including mobile medical units (which gave out over 7,000 diphtheria and tetanus inoculations to combat the conditions). They pro-vided security for their teams as well (with the help of the National Guard).
Employee perseverance
Beyond the basics, however, Entergy faced employees with their own problems: houses destroyed, neighborhoods impassable, fear for relatives or friends they couldn’t find. Vaughan and Dawsey spoke at length about how proud they were of employees who stepped up to the challenges these storms brought, put their own concerns on the back burner, rolled up sleeves—and in many cases pant legs—and got down to the work at hand.
“A lot of my employees lived in those areas that were flooding,” Dawsey recalled. “To their character, they stepped up and did what they had to do until we could get them home.”
“The resiliency of those workers—our own and the ones from other utilities—was just humbling,” Dawsey added. “They’re working sixteen-hour days under some of the worst conditions. No one said, ‘We can’t do this.’ It was always, ‘What else do you have? We’re ready to get the lights back on.’”
If losing the basic social infrastructure of hotels, restau-rants and hospitals was the largest single problem of this storm management, the second was easily the scattering of the utility’s business operations. The New Orleans head-quarters was flooded, and those people were shipped out to satellite offices, man camps and mobile units (including one former Schwegmann’s grocery store).
“We evacuated nearly 2,000 employees and established new locations. The engineering staff went to Texas. We put together a temporary corporate HQ in Mississippi,” Vaughan added. The transmission headquarters building in New
Orleans didn’t reopen for a year, and some of those new locations have stuck permanently. One of the lessons these storms has taught Entergy is not to locate all assets in one spot—and certainly not a spot in a low-lying coastal area.
The second lesson from that massive storm effort centers around communications. Both Vaughan and Dawsey saw this storm recovery as the beginning of Entergy’s new, mod-ern steps in customer and employee communication.
“That was the first really big event where we raised the bar in information provided to the customer on what we were doing,” Dawsey added. “ We realized we had to get our own story out there because the media wasn’t always on the same page with us. And every event teaches us new things
Entergy knows their storm management. In this area, they’ve proven they’ve got the right stuff. (In fact, they’ve won 22 awards from the Edison Electric Institute on the subject.) So, here’s a short list of how they’d advise you to push through your next large-scale outage.
1. Always put safety first. Never sacrifice safety for speed.
2. Give accountability and authority to everyone, not just the brass.
3. Have a centralized incident command structure and use it.
4. Communicate everything that’s going on with employees and with customers, and communi-cate often.
5. Have multiple layers of communication in place: inbound calls, outbound calls, texting, web, back up meeting spots and times if phones and Internet are out.
6. Have a plan to circumvent the social infrastruc-ture (hotels, restaurants, hospitals) if needed.
7. Train your entire team to perform their storm roles well.
8. Have evacuation plans in place for your own employees and headquarters.
9. Establish partnerships with emergency respond-ers, as well as state and local agencies before the storm.
10. Have a business continuity plan.
11. Be ready to improvise.
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about whom we should talk to and what we should talk about. It’s an evolution.”
The third lesson was more hardware ori-ented. Katrina and Rita taught them valuable information on harden-ing and redundancy.
(The utility now has redundant communications centers, too, in Jackson, Mississippi, and Little Rock, Arkansas.)
Dawsey added that the company reassessed the T&D along the coast after the storm, and now they spend $800 million a year on transmission from both a reliability and modernization perspective. They upgraded 25,000-30,000 distribution poles. They raised and/or relocated the sensi-tive electronics at more than 25 substations so that the control housing was above the flood plain.
They also had to pump out and mostly rebuild the entire
gas infrastructure in the area.The storm taught them to build to a higher standard,
Dawsey noted. And it’s shown them new standards to include.
Moving forward
It took about 42 days for Entergy to recover from Katrina and 21 days for it to recover from Rita. (That means they returned power to every place that could take it, though some could not, of course.) Seventy-five percent of custom-ers were restored in 11 days for Katrina, 10 days for Rita.
But, of course, just because the power’s back on doesn’t mean the structure’s back to normal. It took many months to return the system to a normal state, and now, with the upgrades and modernization, there’s a new normal.
“Honestly, we’re still working on this to an extent today,” Dawsey said. “We’re still upgrading based on lessons from those storms. The power’s back on, yes, but we can still build better, more redundant backups for that power. We’re always learning.”
Entergy’s rebuilt Leeville substation, located in coastal Louisiana. Rebuilding this substation was part of a larger project to harden the infrastructure serving Port Fourchon, a major oil/gas port for the Gulf.
“We’re still upgrading
based on lessons
learned from those
storms.”
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OPERATIONAL PERSPECTIVES
WIRELESS COMMUNICATIONS networks provide a practical solution for providing the
coverage and capacity that utilities need to support increased automation of their infrastructure systems. However, utilities need access to suitable spectrum in order to provide the capacity and coverage for these wireless communications systems.
The need for spectrum access is urgent. Utilities and other critical infrastructure industries must meet regu-latory requirements for security, reliability and safety. These regulatory requirements are imposing unprec-edented demands on the underlying communications systems that utilities own and operate. Without access to suitable spectrum, utilities won’t be able to meet these regulatory requirements on a reliable, secure and cost-effective basis.
of critical infrastructure communications
On strategies and spectrum By Brett Kilbourne+Utilities need access to licensed spectrum that
provides greater capacity, is relatively free from interfer-ence, and is supported by standardized equipment that is cost-effective and commercially available. They need broadband blocks of spectrum—or at least wideband channels—to meet their capacity requirements for increased automation. At the same time, they also need spectrum in a frequency range that will cover large geographic areas from a single site. They need spectrum that is licensed in order to provide protection against interference. Ideally, this spectrum would be made available to utilities and other critical infrastructure in a single band or roughly contiguous group of bands. Moreover, this spectrum should be supported by indus-try standards for equipment manufacturers. This would drive economies of scale and interoperability.
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The problem: Spectrum is scarce due to increased demand from consumer devices such as iPhones. Scarcer still is broadband spectrum, especially in a range that provides wide-area coverage. Factor in the need for spectrum that will support standardized equipment, and the options become even more limited. Hence, solving the utility spectrum access challenge won’t be easy.
Utilities and other critical infrastructure providers are pursuing an integrated strategy for identifying suitable spectrum to support their increasing wireless com-munications needs. This strategy requires definition of utility field area networks, estimation of the bandwidth requirements of these networks, and then assessment of different spectrum bands for meeting utility capacity and coverage require-ments. Ultimately, this work will lead to a proposition, one that suggests a specific band (or set of bands) for access by utilities and other critical infrastructure industries on either a dedicated or shared basis.
In reality, utilities will probably need to share spectrum with other wireless communications opera-tions and services. They don’t have access to any dedicated spectrum now, and there are no spectrum allocations being made available in the kind of frequency range that utilities would need to get the coverage required. The new licensed spectrum that is being allocated is such high frequency that the coverage is very small and/or is subject to line-of-sight issues that would block a signal if it ran into buildings or trees. There is some licensed broadband spectrum that would meet utility coverage requirements, but that spectrum is going to be auctioned to the highest bidder. And utilities have been generally unable to compete with the commercial carriers for access to spectrum that is auctioned, espe-cially in metro-markets where the price of spectrum is typically high. Meanwhile, there is some unlicensed spectrum or lightly-licensed spectrum that would
meet utility capacity and coverage requirements, but that spectrum can be subject to interference and congestion, making it unsuitable for mission-critical communications by utilities. As such, the options for access to licensed broadband spectrum are limited, and that is why utilities may need to share as a practi-cal matter.
The good news is that there are spectrum bands that utilities could share, and which would meet their needs for coverage, capacity and standardized/cost-effective equipment. It is now a matter of building the case for utilities to gain access to those bands. By combining factual and policy cases for spectrum access by utilities
and other critical infrastructure industries as part of a methodi-cal and sustained campaign, they will be able to finally break through and gain access to suitable spectrum to meet their increasing needs. And some progress has already been made.
The National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC) has passed a resolution in favor of utility spectrum access, which
recognizes that utilities need access to spectrum in order to promote public safety. At the same time, FirstNet, which oversees the construction, main-tenance and operation of the nationwide 700 MHz Public Safety Broadband Network has tentatively concluded that utilities and other critical infrastruc-ture could be included within the definition of “pub-lic safety entities,” which would have access to the 700 MHz PSBN on a priority basis during emergencies.
Brett Kilbourne is vice president of strategic initiatives and general counsel at the Utilities Telecom Council, which encourages utilities to learn more about this issue and support the spectrum campaign. He can be reached directly at [email protected].
“Spectrum is scarce
due to increased
demand from consumer
devices such
as iPhones.”
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OPERATIONAL PERSPECTIVES
XCEL ENERGY HAS LOOKED in many directions for just the right combination of tools to meet new
electric service needs in a marketplace where innovation is providing power consumers with new choices. But when a high growth situation arose in our New Mexico service area, we learned that nothing is more effective than determina-tion, ingenuity and clear, consistent communication when it comes to solving problems for our customers and giving them what they need when they need it.
Xcel Energy’s Southwestern Public Service Company is based in Amarillo, Texas, and serves six eastern and south-eastern counties in New Mexico that cover more than 21,000 square miles. Southwestern Public Service originated in 1904 with a predecessor company in Roswell, N.M., and our his-tory is deeply intertwined with a state known for its stunning landscapes and its rich history—and a state that also happens to be a major producer of oil and natural gas.
In the early years of the new century, a global spike in oil prices intersected with new oil drilling technologies, and Lea and Eddy counties in the southeastern corner of the state wound up in the crosshairs of intense oil exploration. This area has significant shale oil reserves that were largely untapped until horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing technologies made them accessible.
But sustaining the latest industrial boom was going to be a challenge. The new oil and gas discoveries are mostly in the southern portions of Lea and Eddy counties—sparsely popu-lated lands primarily owned by the state and federal govern-ments with minimal electric transmission and distribution facilities and, in some areas, even a lack of roads. It was virtu-ally impossible to reach the new oilfields with existing lines. Oil companies could drill, but without a long-term plan for
providing power to pump the oil, it might as well remain in the ground.
In 2010, the Southwest Power Pool laid out its Integrated Transmission Plan, identifying key upgrades to boost reli-ability and capacity of the regional power grid that could be built under a cost-sharing plan with all the power pool’s members. By 2013, with oil prices well above $100 a barrel, a boom in oil drilling made clear this plan was not bold enough to meet the New Mexico challenge.
In June 2013, Xcel Energy began promoting an effort known as the High-Priority Incremental Load Study, which was approved by the Southwest Power Pool in April 2014 resulting in 44 new transmission projects for Xcel Energy to build within its New Mexico and Texas service areas. These projects represent a $557 million investment in new high-voltage transmission lines and substations through 2020.
The plans called for 400 miles of new high-voltage transmis-sion lines and 12 new substations, primarily in eastern New Mexico and West Texas. These projects were in addition to more than $60 million in new transmission facilities ap-proved by Southwest Power Pool in February 2014, as well as 240 miles of new, lower-voltage distribution lines that deliver power directly to customers, mostly in Lea and Eddy counties.
The new distribution feeders were planned to be ready to move power the minute the new substations were energized. In order to execute these plans with precision, we had to devise a way to bridge the gaps between diverse internal working groups with different processes. In a company with transmission in 10 states stretching practically from Minnesota to Mexico, this was a challenge. So even before the new lines had been approved, we formed an interdis-ciplinary team made up of employees from siting and land
Running electric transmission as a drilling backbone
By David Hudson
OIL BOOMXcel Energy powers up an
+
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rights to regulatory administration, gave them the flexibility they needed to reach quick milestones, and brought them together regularly to give an account of their progress.
Another challenge early on was that we realized we didn’t fully understand our customers’ needs, and they were unfamiliar with our planning and funding processes. So we launched a three-tiered communication effort to open a dialogue with our customers, starting with frequent, small-group meetings with industrial customers and mov-ing from there to larger meetings with civic leaders. Finally, we stepped up our media communications to provide all customers with consistent messages about the need for new power infrastructure and the value it would bring for decades to come.
An important tool in our mass market communications plan is the Power for the Plains website (www.powerfortheplains.com) where we list all the large transmission projects in our Texas-New Mexico service area. One section of that site deals only with southeast New Mexico projects. Customers can access fact sheets and maps related to each of the several dozen transmis-sion initiatives
In May of this year, the first of our big southeastern New Mexico projects was energized. The new North Loving and China Draw substations in Eddy County, along with 27 miles of new 115-kilovolt line connecting
the two stations to the grid, make an additional 25,000 horsepower available for the motors of area industrial users, primarily the newly completed oil wells. An ad-ditional 40 miles of new 230-kilovolt lines and 19 miles of 115-kilovolt lines planned for the two southeastern coun-ties will be operational by year’s end, and those projects include two new substations and a major upgrade on an existing substation. These improvements will add 250 miles of additional transmission and distribution lines in 2015 in Eddy and Lea counties alone.
And while these are big achievements in serving the new growth in New Mexico, we have many more projects to deliver by 2020. Global oil prices fell sharply in late 2014, but hundreds of new wells that already were drilled are still pumping with diesel generator power. And even with lower prices, new wells are still being drilled. With 111 years of history behind us, we know we must build for the needs of customers today and the needs of customers 20 and 30 years down the road. We have faith in New Mexico, and the suc-cessful start of our southeastern New Mexico capital project gives us confidence that we have the right mix of good ideas, committed people and skill to do whatever it takes to serve the needs of our customers and our communities.
David Hudson is president of Southwestern Public Service Company, an Xcel Energy company.
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OPERATIONAL PERSPECTIVES
LORA TEED FIRST CAUGHT OUR EYE on Twitter. She was one of many great entries in Austin Energy’s push to join in the viral #ilook-
likeanengineer campaign. And we admit we were curious about a utility having a structural engineer on
the team. We’re used to electrical engineers. We’ve talked to a lot of them, but none of us could recall chatting with a structural engineer.
So, we chatted with Lora.Lora’s lucky. She runs with a crowd of engineers and hasn’t had to face trying
to explain what she does to people very often, which most engineers will tell you can be a difficult, painful process. But her group understands project manage-ment. They have the base knowledge to get the basics of her gig. Her family, however, took a bit more explanation, as they’re all a bunch of accountants. But she found common ground there, too.
“I had a fun conversation with my sister a few years ago—my sister does audit-ing—where we discovered that our jobs are the same, really,” Teed said when we spoke. “We both basically take things apart, figure out how they work, and put them back in a way that makes sense for the company.”
And while her sister does that with money, Teed is working with much more tangible items. In the end, though, that putting back together part is the key, that’s where she’s really needed, even if the processes involved can make her a little crazy sometimes. And getting those complex projects through those crazy processes, well that’s her specialty.
Complexity has always been a talent with Teed: How else do you explain any-one who tells you that she loved math and computers as a kid? (Most of us loved cartoons and coloring.)
Teed originally thought she’d be a computer programmer. That’s where she started in college, but a very good mentor—and a very special teacher to her since she can still name that teacher—was, as Teed put it, “a reformed bridge engineer.”
And so Teed became a not-so-reformed bridge engineer—well, a structural engineer, anyway. And she did originally focus on bridges, including bridge inspections, when she got out of grad school. She began in her home state of
talking structural engineering with Austin Energy
A women-in-energy profile of Lora Teed
MATHEMATICS, COMPLEXITY AND
BRIDGE BEAMS:
+
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17
Michigan and then moved down to Texas to do the same. From there, it was a short step and a jump (through the Texas Department of Transportation and the City of Austin) into project management.
Teed’s been working with Austin Energy since 2010, starting in electric service delivery (ESD), where she worked on substation and transmission line projects. (And her description of the place really makes us want to go visit the shop up there and hang out, maybe bring some doughnuts.)
At ESD that pesky joy of complexity continued. She did a lot of one-off proj-ects and became know for “weird” projects, as she labeled them. That history got her the current gig in power production, as they were looking for someone in anticipation of some bigger, more complex—potentially “weird”—projects coming along.
Teed’s and her sister’s jobs are becoming more aligned by the day, since Teed is much more budget-oriented now. There are lots less calculations, at least of the engineering variety. Instead, she’s figuring out outlay, scheduling and processes.
One example: How do they best rebuild an environmental lab? Lora’s got to delve into infrastructure costs, moving costs, consulting fees.
“It’s a funky project,” she said. “I’m trying to figure out how long to bring in the consultant, how to bid out the project, how to get approvals, how the money will be spent. We have to be on the spot.”
There’s that joy of complexity again, and there’s joy in finding that spot, whether that spot is about equations or about processes.
“When I worked as a structural engineer, there was modeling of beams and calculating load and following load and putting them together with plans that were released for a bid. That’s what engineering is: putting on a piece of paper what’s inside your head so someone could build it,” she said.
“But as I progressed in this career, it became less about the math I loved, that drew me in, and became more and more about the people. But I’ve found that I love that, too,” she added.
That love made her an obvious candidate for the utility’s participation in the #ilooklikeanengineer campaign on Twitter, which began when coworkers no-ticed the trend online and decided to ask around to see who at the utility might be willing to show off their engineering stuff as part of the hashtag movement. And Teed jumped in with a blurb and a desperate search for a photo of herself that was decent and in a hardhat and not just a project pic of “piles of dirt or a transformer.”
She conquered that complex search, and the tweet that caught our eye was born. As for what she hopes that tweet and that campaign mean—well, she hopes it gets people to think a little differently.
“We push boys to play with trucks and girls to play with dolls and then we’re surprised that not many girls sign up for engineering,” she said. “I was one of three women in my structural engineering concentration. At my first company, which was a large consulting firm, I was the only woman in a suite of 40-plus engineers.”
Teed admits that the environment is changing, and she is seeing more women in her field these days. But she also hopes the campaign might rev that up a bit.
“I’ve seen powerful women pave the way in front of me, and I hope to see more and more powerful women come up behind me. You can do the math, too, ladies,” she said. “Be strong. Decide what you want and then go get what you want.”
Teed did.
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WHAT IF YOU CAN’T
BUILD
THAT NEW TRANSMISSION LINE?
OPERATIONAL PERSPECTIVES
AS THE U.S. CONTINUES to use more power in more places, utilities are trying to keep up with increased demand and an aging transmission system, parts of which date back to the 1880s. Furthermore, the United States alone has ap-proximately 360,000 miles of transmission lines, 70 percent of which are estimated by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to be more than 25 years old. With the increased demand for system reliability and resiliency, utilities are now being asked to strengthen their systems.
In many cases, the option to build new trans-mission lines does not exist. The existing cor-ridors are at capacity, and acquiring the land for a new transmission line route is often not feasible for a variety of reasons. Consequently, utilities are turning to other options to get more out of their existing transmission lines. This can mean several things: simple structure replacements and raises, dynamic line ratings or reconductoring and rebuilding existing lines. All of these will help to push more power through existing facilities, remediate issues like clearance concerns, add ex-tra years to a line’s life, and to improve the overall reliability of the line.
Doing more
with what you have
By Sarah Beckman
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Where to start
In order to effectively address the issue, a clearly defined goal and approach must be set. What needs to be achieved? Is more ground clearance required to reach the current rat-ing? Is there a higher line rating needed?
To start, determine the desired facility rating. Next, de-velop a design criteria by which to analyze the existing line. Typically, a utility has predefined design criteria. However, in some instances, it is worth reviewing to determine if there are areas to tweak: Maybe a large clearance buffer isn’t necessary, or a reduction on allowable swing angles may be appropriate. Making these modifications can al-low more flexibility in design and potential cost savings. Finally, construction constraints must be considered. Lead time on materials, difficult terrain, equipment required for construction, and land access all play a large role in the engineering and design. Identifying these key items helps to ensure a successful project from inception to energization.
Examining minimal construction alternatives
The first, and perhaps most simple, option to gain system reliability, increase ground clearance and to effectively extend the life of a line is to replace structures on an as-needed basis. This alternative works best if the majority of the line is in good condition. Additionally, replacing structures with taller ones can increase the line capacity and allow a higher line rating if not already at the conductor’s maximum capacity. Structure material selection depends on how quickly the structure needs to be installed, what is available, and the terrain. Wood is the most common material and lead times can be relatively fast if not already in stock. However, it is not always the ideal choice. For areas where land access is by foot traffic only, fiberglass structures are becoming more common. They are light and durable, sections can be carried in, and are installed quickly. Steel is a great option for helicopter work and for lines that require a longer lifespan, however lead times can be 24 weeks or more. If gaining additional ground clearance is the objec-tive, lattice tower extensions and phase raisers essentially jack up existing structures if they are in good condition.
To determine a line’s true capacity in the field and optimize an existing line, especially at times of peak load, dynamic line ratings are a great solution. These devices monitor the conductor over time, including such charac-teristics as conductor temperature, clearance, load, and weather to provide a reliability-based rating. With this, the maximum capacity of the facility can be determined. There are several companies that manufacture the equipment, and it can minimize the amount of additional money put into a line based on a facility rating. They may be moved
around to critical spans for monitoring and on several lines to develop a picture of the broader system. Because of this, dynamic line rating is a great option if the goal is to increase the efficient use of an existing line and provide higher asset utilization and reliability.
Looking at reconductoring and rebuilding
If a line in an existing corridor is relatively new, but a higher rating is needed, reconductoring the existing line is a viable option. Many different types of higher capacity cables such as 3M and ACCC (aluminum conductor, composite core) are manufactured. Generally, these are high capac-ity, high temperature, low sag conductors that can often provide the necessary rating while still maintaining the re-quired ground clearance to operate at a higher temperature. In these cases, it is important to recognize that the existing structures must be reanalyzed for heavier cable and the sag-ging characteristics are different. It is likely that deadends will have to be replaced. However, it is still a cost-saving solution when compared to the alternatives.
Rebuilding a line, while not usually the least expensive option, can provide perhaps the most comprehensive solution ensuring reliability and increasing a facility rating to a line that’s at the end of its life span. This provides more reliability and resiliency, the potential for a higher capacity conduc-tor, and taller structures. It can also use existing right of way to mitigate the need for additional permitting, landowner involvement, and access issues that may be confronted when trying to build a new line in a new corridor. The scope of a line rebuild can be as simple as a structure-for-structure replacement with either a new, higher capacity conductor or taller structures, to upgrading to multi-circuit structures for additional capacity, if the easements allow. Ultimately, the line rebuild is the most comprehensive solution, cost permitting.
In order to keep up with the ever-growing need for power in more places and a more reliable grid, and in an attempt to maximize existing facilities, utilities have several options: The life of a line may be extended and rating in-creased by (1.) replacing a handful of older, at-risk struc-tures; (2.) using dynamic line rating to determine the true capacity of the existing line or (3.) reconductoring if it is in good condition and more capacity is needed to get the most out of the existing utility. In a time when we are trying to do more with what we have, these are all viable options to get more out of what’s existing, saving money where possible, and providing the increased reliability that is required.
Sarah Beckman is a technical manager in the transmission, distribu-tion and communications department for Ulteig Engineers in Denver.
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Jeff Tolnar, the new president of Elster,
Americas believes edge-based generation,
standardization and security are the keys to
the industry’s future.
Tolnar took over as president of the Raleigh,
North Carolina-based operations in June of this
year. Previously, he held senior officer positions
within several Fortune 100 companies and co-
founded three start-ups.
At Elster, Tolnar’s team is responsible for creating
and delivering leading-edge solutions to the electri-
cal utility market. It does so by driving products for
the edge of the electrical network and by offering
solutions that convert mass data into useful busi-
ness intelligence.
Tolnar believes that edge-
based generation is a primary
catalyst within the industry
and will drive the smart sys-
tems utilities will require to
remain competitive.
“The future is clearly mov-
ing in the direction of edge-
based generation,” Tolnar
said. “It’s logical, and al-
though current costs are high,
it has a solid cost benefit in
the long haul. And, of course, it is what the end cus-
tomers and many regulators are pushing for. But we
have to be ready for it. We have to be able to man-
Utility Evolution Depends on Standards, Security By Justine Brown
age and leverage this emerging edge intelligence.”
Tolnar said because the edge is also where energy
is consumed, whether it’s by a household, a business
or an industry, it must be managed differently.
“When you have energy being created at the
edge, past protection schemes and former meth-
ods of energy delivery have to be adjusted and
adapted,” he said.
Meters that previously mea-
sured only energy consumption
are now evolving to become
smart sensors, said Tolnar, and
as they do so they have the
ability to become foundations
for applications and advanced
technologies that can interact
and create balance at the edge
of the grid.
However, such an evolution
will require equilibrium among
edge intelligence, central intel-
ligence and the supporting
communication platform, said
Tolnar.
“This evolution is about effi-
ciently handling mass amounts
of data from millions of sensor
points, all potentially interacting, all in a dynamic
near real-time environment,” he said. “You’ve got all
this happening at the edge, you have mass data in
the center, you have communications between the
two—and they have to work harmoniously to get
to the point where the grid can sustain a free-flow
state including traditional central generation, plus
the growing edge-based supply.”
To make this happen, Tolnar believes utilities must
drive to standards and continue improving secu-
rity—and they must do so collectively.
“We need to go all-in on a set of foundational,
emerging standards in order to achieve true in-
teroperability so that the entire industry can make
that leap forward,” he said. “The opportunity is
enormous, and there’s plenty of utility customer
need for all of the vendors to perform well from
a business perspective, but it’s best for the whole
industry if we do so collaboratively.”
Security is also vital. Tolnar believes that cross-
industry forums focused on security would allow
the utility sector to leverage security best prac-
tices from a broad range of industries. Beyond
that, Tolnar said security has to
be multi-layered and multi-fac-
eted, including considerations
for physical, network, soft-
ware development, and virtual
environment security. And as
the Internet of Things evolves,
connecting and IP-enabling all
sorts of devices and sensors
within homes, businesses and
the grid itself, the importance
of bullet-proof security will
only grow.
“We’ll have to make sure
we’ve covered all the security
aspects related to new opera-
tional models. It’s a much dif-
ferent and more diverse secu-
rity challenge than we’ve ever
encountered before,” Tolnar said. “But we should
work with and leverage what other industries know,
because when you talk about security of IoT and
connected devices, they are very similar challenges.
Whether you’re preventing criminals from hacking
banks or from hacking the utility industry, many of
the methods and the entry points are similar.”
“It is certainly an exciting time for the industry;
we are at a very significant inflection point,” said
Tolnar. “If we can work collaboratively on building
the right balanced edge and central intelligence
approaches, driving real standards-based interop-
erability, and insisting on the relentless pursuit of
shared security best practices, then we have a great
future ahead of us.”
“This evolution is
about efficiently
handling mass amounts
of data from millions
of sensor points, all
potentially interacting,
all in a dynamic near
real-time environment.”
THOUGHT LEADERSHIP - SPONSORED BY ELSTER THOUGHT LEADERSHIP - SPONSORED BY ELSTER
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Jeff Tolnar, the new president of Elster,
Americas believes edge-based generation,
standardization and security are the keys to
the industry’s future.
Tolnar took over as president of the Raleigh,
North Carolina-based operations in June of this
year. Previously, he held senior officer positions
within several Fortune 100 companies and co-
founded three start-ups.
At Elster, Tolnar’s team is responsible for creating
and delivering leading-edge solutions to the electri-
cal utility market. It does so by driving products for
the edge of the electrical network and by offering
solutions that convert mass data into useful busi-
ness intelligence.
Tolnar believes that edge-
based generation is a primary
catalyst within the industry
and will drive the smart sys-
tems utilities will require to
remain competitive.
“The future is clearly mov-
ing in the direction of edge-
based generation,” Tolnar
said. “It’s logical, and al-
though current costs are high,
it has a solid cost benefit in
the long haul. And, of course, it is what the end cus-
tomers and many regulators are pushing for. But we
have to be ready for it. We have to be able to man-
Utility Evolution Depends on Standards, Security By Justine Brown
age and leverage this emerging edge intelligence.”
Tolnar said because the edge is also where energy
is consumed, whether it’s by a household, a business
or an industry, it must be managed differently.
“When you have energy being created at the
edge, past protection schemes and former meth-
ods of energy delivery have to be adjusted and
adapted,” he said.
Meters that previously mea-
sured only energy consumption
are now evolving to become
smart sensors, said Tolnar, and
as they do so they have the
ability to become foundations
for applications and advanced
technologies that can interact
and create balance at the edge
of the grid.
However, such an evolution
will require equilibrium among
edge intelligence, central intel-
ligence and the supporting
communication platform, said
Tolnar.
“This evolution is about effi-
ciently handling mass amounts
of data from millions of sensor
points, all potentially interacting, all in a dynamic
near real-time environment,” he said. “You’ve got all
this happening at the edge, you have mass data in
the center, you have communications between the
two—and they have to work harmoniously to get
to the point where the grid can sustain a free-flow
state including traditional central generation, plus
the growing edge-based supply.”
To make this happen, Tolnar believes utilities must
drive to standards and continue improving secu-
rity—and they must do so collectively.
“We need to go all-in on a set of foundational,
emerging standards in order to achieve true in-
teroperability so that the entire industry can make
that leap forward,” he said. “The opportunity is
enormous, and there’s plenty of utility customer
need for all of the vendors to perform well from
a business perspective, but it’s best for the whole
industry if we do so collaboratively.”
Security is also vital. Tolnar believes that cross-
industry forums focused on security would allow
the utility sector to leverage security best prac-
tices from a broad range of industries. Beyond
that, Tolnar said security has to
be multi-layered and multi-fac-
eted, including considerations
for physical, network, soft-
ware development, and virtual
environment security. And as
the Internet of Things evolves,
connecting and IP-enabling all
sorts of devices and sensors
within homes, businesses and
the grid itself, the importance
of bullet-proof security will
only grow.
“We’ll have to make sure
we’ve covered all the security
aspects related to new opera-
tional models. It’s a much dif-
ferent and more diverse secu-
rity challenge than we’ve ever
encountered before,” Tolnar said. “But we should
work with and leverage what other industries know,
because when you talk about security of IoT and
connected devices, they are very similar challenges.
Whether you’re preventing criminals from hacking
banks or from hacking the utility industry, many of
the methods and the entry points are similar.”
“It is certainly an exciting time for the industry;
we are at a very significant inflection point,” said
Tolnar. “If we can work collaboratively on building
the right balanced edge and central intelligence
approaches, driving real standards-based interop-
erability, and insisting on the relentless pursuit of
shared security best practices, then we have a great
future ahead of us.”
“This evolution is
about efficiently
handling mass amounts
of data from millions
of sensor points, all
potentially interacting,
all in a dynamic near
real-time environment.”
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CUSTOMER FOCUS
THE LAST TIME WE HEARD from Avista Utilities’ Vicki Weber, director of energy delivery technology, and Pat Dever, director of applications and
systems programming, about their work replacing a legacy customer informa-tion system (CIS) named Project Compass, they were busy working out the kinks, thinking about the existential issues—which Weber called “unwinding the yarn ball”—and looking for a whole lot of input.
[Editor’s note: See the cover story of our July/Aug. 2013 issue for more details, which is available online.]
While on the phone with Weber and Dever, about the project at the time, Weber had a bit of a Freudian slip that they were in the “divine phase” and then corrected it to “design phase.”
“I wish we were in the divine phase,” she joked then. Perhaps that awe-inspiring time has finally arrived because Avista’s Project
Compass is now live. “I knew it was going to be divine,” Weber said when we chatted again this
summer about the project. “I think that slip [two years ago] was an inspiration.”Indeed, getting that massive project complete must feel like an inspired feat,
though Dever added that it took a lot of perspiration along with that inspira-tion—a lot of sweating the small stuff in over 7,000 test cases that brought in every aspect of the utility that might remotely touch that CIS, from call centers to ops, to finance to the meter shop.
It wasn’t easy. “We’re talking over 100 integrations and over 60 systems touched by data that moved from one system to another,” Dever said.
“Understanding the complexity of what we were working on was a challenge,” he added. “In the end, the estimate-to-actual is always difficult on projects of this magnitude. Trying to drive toward the completion of anything was exhaus-tive—making sure it fit to the business, making the software do what we need to get done.”
There were also some timing hurdles as the utility weathered one particular system integrator changing hands twice during the project, which did delay things a bit.
EMBROILED IN A LEGACY REPLACEMENT PROJECT? Here’s some great advice from Vicki & Pat.
Vicki says: Nametheproject.Itcreatesidentityforevery-one.WecalledoursProjectCompass,ofcourse.Andthenwecouldgooutonthestreetandtellothersabouttheproj-ect.Ifyounameyourproject,it’saloteasierforeveryoneinthecompanytotalkabout.
Pat says:Takethetimeandfindtheabsolutebestresourcesyoucanfind—in-sideandoutsidethecom-pany.Supplementwithotherresources.Bringpeoplein.Havingtherightskillsetisveryimportant.Youcan-notachievethiswithpeoplelearningastheygo.
Vicki says:Budgetsgrowonyou.Theygetbiggerastheprojectgoeson.
Pat says:Stayawayfromcus-tomizationifyoucan.Itcre-atesunnecessarycomplexity.
Vicki says:Commitmentstartsatthetop.Execshavetowalkandtalkthecommit-mentandthebuyin.Iftheydon’tdoit,theemployeesandtheteamstrugglewithbuyin,too.
Pat says:Controltheap-petite/demandfromothersystems.Everythinghasatradeoff.Withourproject,forexample,someofthethingsbusinesswantedtoaccom-plishhadtowait.Youcan’tdoeverythingandbesuccessful.Theremustbeafocus.
They both say: Test,testandretest.Testcasesareim-perativetolaunchinganewsystemandeliminatingwork-aroundsanddefects.
Avista’sProjectCompassgoeslive
+CIS moves from divine design to reality road test
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THERE’S JUST A WEALTH of stuff to talk about when you phone up National Grid U.S., one of the major utility players in the country.
They’ve recently put together a new division. They’re participating in New York’s Reforming the Energy Vision (REV) project. They’re working on grid modern-ization in Massachusetts, which they delightfully refer to as “GridMod,” which makes me picture them all wearing '60s mod clothing. (It’s an amusing vision.)
After those delays and on top of those 7,000 tests, Avista performed three extensive dress rehearsals, just like the local theater company prep-ping for an opening of “Cats.” Well, maybe not exactly like it, since we doubt anyone in Weber’s or Dever’s groups was dressed like a giant cat, and we doubt a dress rehearsal of “Cats” would involve business processes and an effort to integrate disparate tech systems. But you get the idea: There were some issues found, some items cleared up and, finally, all was ready for opening night.
For Project Compass, opening night happened during the Super Bowl this year, which had Washington state’s home team playing.
“The Seattle Seahawks were in the Super Bowl. We went live around 2 p.m. that day, and we were able to send people home to watch the game at 3 p.m.. It went that smoothly,” Weber said.
She added that the dangled Super Bowl carrot certainly was their moti-vation—that, if all went well, everyone goes home to their recliners, their beer hats and their Seahawks jerseys to watch with friends and family.
And it worked. Project Compass’ opening night—or opening afternoon, if you will—went smoothly. (Weber noted that call volume the first week after was a bit higher but returned to normal by the fifth week, which is a fast return to average.)
The multi-year project taught Avista some valuable lessons about system management that they can use in the future. And, luckily, Project Compass brought them just the right people to help.
“Compass armed us with a team of people that will be very valuable to go forward and take part and assist in any of the new technology projects Avista will be working on,” Weber said, although admittedly that tal-ented team didn’t happen overnight. It took about 25,000 hours of training
in customer service and 10,000 hours on the ops side. But all that work online, in the classroom and with self-directed learning paid off.
And while the utility gets that well-oiled machine of a team for new projects in the short term, they’ll also get great benefits down the road in new areas that the project can help with: time-of-use and prepay, for example, planning for new products, MDM, taking a harder look at AMI and outage management.
Project Compass may be complete, but its capabilities live on.“Projects of this magnitude are really never finished,” Dever noted. “It’s reality.
There are things we deferred on purpose that we are now taking care of. There are new requirements that come up every day.”
“At the end of the project, you want to say ‘we’re ready to go live,’” Weber added. “But when you say ‘we’ve gone live,’ it ignites the business. They’re ready to do all the work they were waiting on for that foundation software. We’ve just begun, really. Go live was just the start.”
NationalGrid:theutilityalphawhenitcomestocustomerlistening
+A chat with White & ReedBy Kathleen Wolf Davis
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CUSTOMER FOCUS
Lots of stuff going on. Lots of action. Lots of interactions. So, I stole a few minutes out of one very busy day for Ed White, the vice president of that shiny new division known as New Energy Solutions, and Marcy Reed, the presi-dent of National Grid in Massachusetts, who is keeping an overview eye on those GridMod activities.
I wanted to know more about these new shake-ups in the utility: what they mean, how they all work together, what they all say about the—to steal from White’s division name—new energy future.
So, starting with White, I asked the burning question: Why? Why a new di-vision? Why bother? What started this process? (OK, I asked more than one question but all thematically related.)
White pointed to all the stuff go-ing on in the Northeast today as one reason his new division exists—REV, the modernization work, markets, customer desires, and the push of poli-cymakers. The division, rather than being an internal push to redesign, came from an external force rearrang-ing the whole darn energy world.
“We’re fortunate enough to live in the Northeast with some pretty progressive desires to have a green and renewables focus on energy needs,” White said. “Creating this new group helps us focus and get excited about the transformation activities happen-ing all around us.”
But, while the division is shiny and new, the idea, according to White, really began long ago when National Grid started pushing out feelers into energy efficiency and smart grid. The new division simply “builds on that DNA,” he added.
Reed chimed in that it’s really all an evolution, of sorts, even going back further to that old pipes and wires foundation. But, times change and so must National Grid.
“We’ve been a provider of safe, reliable energy for over 100 years. However, customer expectations
evolve,” she said. “And while they still expect the lights to come on, they also increasingly want better data. They want more products and services. They want to make better decisions around energy use.”
And so the New Energy Solutions division was born to meet those changing customer expectations—and, hopefully, to anticipate the next ones, too.
So how do they know what those customers expect? Well, they ask. They ask for customer input into programs and after large storms. They sort through, categorize and respond to complaints and frustrations. They do surveys and fo-cus groups. They look at work other utilities have done. (And they gave a shout out to OG&E’s smart meter program design with its customer focus.) And they hold summits with communities, policyholders and even academics. Apparently, there’s a whole lot of communication involved in understanding what a cus-tomer really wants.
In fact, in Worcester, Massachusetts, they have a storefront on Main Street called the Sustainability Hub that is a community space. It allows them to “share information on a granular level,” White said. (Learn more about the Sustainability Hub with a search online for our profile from last year. Just look for “National Grid’s Sustainability Hub gathers customers and community.”)
Reed added that her group also held group sessions for energy influenc-ers, who could range from managers to emergency people, before they put together their GridMod filing.
And that feedback is reflected in not just the utility’s GridMod work in Massachusetts, but also in the new division, in the REV work—well, in every-thing, really.
“This is the future,” Reed said. “We fully recognize this will be the new nor-mal. This level of customer focus is now embedded within our core business. It represents the vision that we hold.”
“Our industry really thinks that the problem always needs a tech solution, but we’re thinking differently. We’re really coming up with a customer solu-tion,” White added. “Sometimes even the new tech is really a customer solu-tion. It’s what they want, and it answers a problem they have.”
“Our customers are more able these days to describe what they want and what it might look like because we’re all more plugged in and interconnected,” Reed chimed in. “Literally, we have college students at the Hub that say, ‘Hey, I can create an app for that.’ It’s just the way the world is going. It’s the way we’re all going.”
So how does an old school utility survive in this new school, app-heavy universe? Well, White suggests this direct tidbit: Quit trying to avoid it and get involved. Get in front of this disruption. Oh, and like National Grid, listen to cus-tomers. He admits that National Grid may be a bit in the “early adopters” camp on the customer interface front, but he sees it being valuable to every utility.
Reed noted that, really, it will be decades before the traditional utility isn’t the norm. That is, she doesn’t see anyone being in imminent danger of no lon-ger existing. But she admits there’s definitely a shift coming eventually. What’s currently about 10 percent of the business (solar, DER, storage) will become a larger portion of every utility’s portfolio. (White agreed, adding that the future role of utilities may lie with integration—plugging things into the grid—more than anything else.)
“But if you’re worried about what your existence will look like in that new world, now’s the time to shape it,” Reed said. “Work it. Build it. I had a boss that would tell us: Only the lead dog has a different view. It’s so true. You want to see what’s coming? Get out in front, whether that’s with tech or with the customer.”
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INTERNATIONAL
A RAPIDLY INCREASING share of renewable energy in the power genera-tion mix across Asia is necessitating investment in T&D upgrades, smart meters and microgrids.
In China, renewables accounted for 13 percent of the total electricity genera-tion in 2014. According to the Global Wind Energy Council, China has installed 115 GW of wind and is forecast to hit 200 GW by 2020. China’s solar PV output is around 35 GW and, with a national target of 100 GW, this could triple by the end of the decade.
The enormous spread of renewables in China—its wind capacity accounts for one-third of the world’s total—is transforming the nation’s grid. Around 90 per-cent of the wind installations are connected to State Grid Corporation of China’s network.
In an effort to bring often remote wind power to China’s cities and reduce cur-tailment, State Grid has added three AC and four DC ultra-high-voltage (UHV) lines to its network—with three AC lines and one DC to be commissioned next year, plus one AC and four DC lines to follow in 2017.
However, UHV lines have proven controversial, with AC connections seen
as unstable and putting the power grid at risk, as well as being uneco-nomical given construction costs and energy losses. It is estimated that State Grid spent 400 billion yuan ($63bn) on its networks last year.
China is now re-evaluating its strategy of building ever more UHV lines. According to Frost & Sullivan’s Asia-Pacific energy analyst Ravi Krishnaswamy, the integration of smart grids could be crucial to the adoption of an alternative solution.
“China does not have interconnec-tion or a power pool in the region, nor does it have an efficient trading mechanism,” he said. “Load schedul-ing and dispatch still follow a tradi-
Asianmarketsseerapidtechgrowth
+China in renewables, Japan in smart meters By Tim Probert
“The enormous spread
of renewables in China
is transforming that
nation’s grid. ”
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tional philosophy … so the ability to analyze demand patterns for electric-ity and integrate them with accurate weather forecasting will help utilities avoid stranded investments into ex-pensive T&D upgrades for renewable integration.”
In July, China’s National Develop-ment and Reform Commission said the country would accelerate deploy-ment of “flexible” control capability over transmission lines and active power distribution networks to fully utilize its renewable generation. China will also speed up construction of microgrids and promote the develop-ment of energy sources that do not need transmission lines, including distributed solar projects.
Smart meters are also set to figure strongly. According to ABI Research, 210 million smart meters were installed in China last year, and the total installed base is predicted to reach 780 million by the end of the decade.
The company estimates Asia-Pacific as a whole will account for 65 percent of the world’s installed smart meter base by 2020.
Japan’s plans to boost energy ef-ficiency could make it one of the top markets in the region for smart grid deployment. Following the Fukushima nuclear disaster in 2011, Japan suffered substantial damage to its grid infrastructure, along with a reduction in its baseload generation.
As a result it has encouraged en-ergy efficiency and renewables, while last year Japan’s energy department launched a program to encourage microgrid development. The $21 mil-lion program makes funding avail-able for independent demonstration projects.
Smart meters are another strong area of growth. Major electric utilities are expediting deployment of residential smart meters in prepara-
tion for the liberalization of the electricity retail markets in April 2016, when consumers will be able to choose their supplier.
Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco) and Kansai Electric Power Company (Kepco) plan to install about 7.5 million smart meters nationwide this year, more than double the
3.66 million installed last year.Four utilities (Tohoku Electric Power Company, Tepco, Hokuriku Electric
Power Company and Kyushu Electric Power Company) have installed 750,000 smart meters at commercial premises. In total, 78 million meters are scheduled for deployment between 2016 and 2024.
In South Korea, state-run power company Kepco is developing smart grid technologies as a new export market and plans to spend $155 million between 2015 and 2017 testing them in major cities such as Seoul and Incheon.
Korea’s long-term plan is to apply smart grid technologies across the country by 2030 as it eyes a two-pronged attack of Southeast Asian export markets and increasing energy efficiency by almost 50 percent.
Southeast Asia itself will invest $13.6 billion in smart grid infrastructure through 2024, according to Northeast Group LLC.
Singapore is currently ahead of the rest of the region in development, with Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam and the Philippines expected to make significant smart grid investments later in the decade.
Southeast Asian nations are expected to deploy 37.3 million smart meters, accounting for $8.8 billion in investment. The Philippines alone is seen to invest $2.1 billion in smart meters, distribution automation, home energy management, information technology and other smart grid market segments, with 5.8 million smart meters deployed by 2024.
Manila Electric Company has started the ball rolling with an $18 million program for pilot testing smart grid infrastructure in the Philippines. Meralco is running a 40,000 smart meter pilot in conjunction with GE, Trilliant, Cisco and Germany’s Orga Systems.
Aboitiz Power Corporation, which manages distribution utilities throughout the Philippines, is to develop a smart grid road map and implementation plan for the Visayas region.
In Indonesia, which aims to achieve 90 percent electrification by 2025, microgrids are mushrooming. Thailand, where the political situation has im-proved, and Malaysia also offer plenty of potential for microgrids.
Meanwhile in Australia, government-supported action to reform network tariffs, deregulate retail electricity pricing and deploy more advanced meters is expected to lay the foundations for smart grid. A July ruling by the Australian Energy Market Commission states all new or replacement meters should be smart by 2017.
Tim Probert is a London-based freelance writer with a focus on European power markets and new smart grid technology. He helms Millicent Media and can be reached at [email protected].
“Japan’s plans to boost
energy efficiency could
make it one of the top
markets in the region.”
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DESPITE BEING DISTINCTLY AMERICAN, I have one French love. I’ve been to the Eiffel Tower three times in my life, and I plan to go again this
coming autumn. I’ve shopped on the first floor, taken those elevators up and the stairs back down and even eaten at the Jules Verne (that’s the restaurant on the second floor). That industrial latticework masterpiece—originally built by Gustave Eiffel for the 1889 World’s Fair—is one of my favorite spots in the world (in spite of the massive crowds you often encounter to visit).
So I was both intrigued and concerned to find out that my great French love is evolving. UGE International recently installed wind turbines onto the famous tower as part of a reno that will bring all sorts of new sights to the first floor. But, don’t worry: the Société d’Exploitation de la Tour Eiffel (SETE)—the group put in charge by the City of Paris to maintain the tower—knows all about those turbines.
According to Jan Gromadzki, the UGE engineer who managed the project, the Eiffel Tower administrators approached them more than a year ago as plans were being set down about possible renovations.
“They were interested in exploring distributed wind technology, and with our experience in vertical axis wind turbines, sought out UGE both for our turbines and our expertise with feasibility and turbine siting,” Gromadzki said.
UGE’s specially designed turbines—a part of a SETE facelift project that has
been labeled the first in 30 years—are painted to match the tower. So, they blend in, and, while officially a part of the first-floor restoration, the turbines themselves rest above the second level to get more wind, of course. (They are expected to offset the power use of the commercial areas of the first floor by ramping up nearly 10,000 kWh annually.)
While I would have been nervous as all get out dealing with an icon like the Eiffel, Gromadzki and the team took it all in stride.
“Although it was a milestone project with unique challenges, the project goal was the same as it is for any other project we would do around the world: provide a renewable energy system that performs and produces energy as it should” Gromadzki added. “Once the technicalities of the site were un-derstood, the process was smooth. We definitely applied more caution than usual due to the logistical assembly challenges, but I was fortunate to work with a very competent team who had experience working on the Tower from previous (non-turbine) projects.”
And the turbines on the Eiffel are as much about education as they are about power, it seems. (According to UGE, one of the major goals of the face-lift was to achieve a significant
Windturbinesontheworld’smosticonictower?
+The Eiffel evolves By Kathleen Wolf Davis
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reduction in the Tower’s ecological footprint as part of the City of Paris Climate Plan.)
Gromadzki continued, “The wind turbines will be visible to the millions of tourists and visitors who come to the Eiffel Tower each year. They’ve taken tremendous steps to reduce their energy and become more sus-tainable, and our goal is that the tur-bines educate and inspire others to do the same. In addition to the turbines and solar water heating, 100 percent of the energy for the tower comes from off-site renewable sources.”
For our engineers and tech heads out there, Gromadzki assured us that the turbines are grid-tied, pushing power back into the system. They’re not just pretty eye candy for education. And, it would have been a lot of work for just educational purposes—no matter how high profile.
Gromadzki told us that each and every part of each and every turbine
had to be “hoisted up to the second level us-ing ropes, winches, and harnesses” in a very old-fashioned system for such new-fangled technology. (The Eiffel Tower prohibits lifting equipment, which made the process quite challenging.)
Although I had hoped the process was done in full view of daily tourists, apparently a lot of it happened at night when the tower was closed to the public.
“During the final days of the installation, though, people down below could watch the ac-tion, and we had great views of the entire city,” Gromadzki said. “The installation happened in January. So, we faced some high winds and cold weather, but everything went very smoothly.”
While this project brought a lot of positive attention to the Tower, distributed renewable energy and UGE—including a call from us, of course—Gromadzki hopes that “it’s only a short time until solar and wind technologies on iconic buildings no longer turn any heads.”
While I get that sentiment, those turbines will certainly turn mine the next time I visit the Eiffel. I’ll be keeping an eye out and snapping some pictures.
I have not yet returned to the Eiffel, but the lead art was taken by me on a previous trip. All other photos in this story are courtesy of UGE and used with permission.
“The parts had to
be hoisted up to the
second level with ropes
and harnesses because
the Tower prohibits
lifting equipment.”
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IN THE WORLD ECONOMY, Latin America stands out: a region of great resources and cultural roots that are shared by many. Of all the develop-
ing places in the world, it could move the fastest toward a 21st century electrical grid. But as with North American energy infrastructure, the Latin American grid has to adjust to accommodate solar and wind power as they reach scale. And other issues remain such as theft of electrical service.
A report prepared by Northeast Group, an electrical infrastructure research and consulting firm, in August 2015 highlights many of these concerns and actions—like grid improvements and smart metering—taken by nations in Latin America to address them. “Beyond Brazil, countries such as Colombia, Ecuador, Chile and Argentina are serious about grid modernization and planning significant invest-ment,” said Ben Gardner, president of Northeast Group. “In total, South America will invest $22.6 billion in smart metering, $7.2 billion in distribution automation and $8.3 billion in other smart grid market segments over 2015 to 2025.”
Solar power trends in Latin America
Chile leads the photovoltaic market in Latin America in installed capacity, according to Evaristo Doria, Ed.D, faculty member and Latin American business opportunity researcher, Georgia State University.
“But in Brazil a solar revolution is gathering,” he said. “There will be a solar auction in November. The winners will obtain 20-year power purchase contracts. Brazil has set a goal of 3.5 gigawatts of solar capacity by 2023.” Not only will this be made up of large-scale solar farms but also micro- and mini-generation from residences and commercial properties, according to Doria.
Indeed, these new, smaller sources of renewable energy generation will chal-lenge the grid in Latin America as this model of decentralized power takes hold.
“Solar photovoltaic distributed generation is gaining momentum in Brazil, Peru and Colombia thanks to governmental initiatives for solutions to provide electricity to isolated areas,” said Maria Benintende, Latin America energy and environment industry analyst, Frost & Sullivan. “The evolution of net metering regulations with declining module costs will rapidly expand generalized use of solar photovoltaic to industrial, commercial and residential consumers.”
Wind power currents in Latin AmericaAlthough solar energy has made some strides in Latin America, wind power is
further along and outpaces the world as a whole. “In the last 10 years wind gen-eration capacity increased worldwide 25 percent on average; in the same period, South America grew 51 percent—Central America 42 percent,” said Emerson de Souza, vice president of electricity for Latin America, Itron, an energy resources technology and services company. “On the other hand we haven’t done a good job with solar, less than 1 percent of the regional matrix comes from solar.”
Overall, solar and wind have strong potential across most of South America but are not yet well developed, accord-ing to Chris Testa, research director, Northeast Group: “Incentives are now in place in Brazil and Chile, which should help kick-start those markets. There are large plans for solar in north-ern Chile. Argentina and Uruguay have also invested significantly in wind, but Uruguay is still a small market and Argentina’s overall electricity rate freeze complicates plans there.”
Theft or customers just out
of town?
Even with gaudy figures forecast for investment in electrical grid upgrades, Latin American utilities do not have limitless capital and need to choose carefully where to deploy it. One such area, electrical service theft, remains a tricky one. “It is a dilemma where to invest to recover money,” said Márcio Dobal, vice president, Latin America, SAS, provider of analytics IP and con-sulting services to the utilities sector.
According to Dobal, some util-ity customers do not pay their bills because they cannot, and there is a low likelihood of recovering overdue charges. “Others travel a lot,” he said of customers overdue but much more likely to pay. “(Utilities) don’t charge (these customers) because they know they will pay on the other end. Software optimizes the behavior of taking ac-tions of figuring out who will pay.”
For example, Brazilian electrical group company CEMIG uses this technology to save about 1.5 million Brazilian reals per month by identi-fying commercial losses related to mis-use of energy and technical failures, according to SAS.
Derek Handova is a veteran journalist and content marketer writing on various B2B vertical beats. He contributes regularly to B2B News Network and Economy Lead. He can be reached at [email protected].
Sun,wind&electricitytheft
+Smart grid trends in Latin AmericaBy Derek Handova
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Upon assuming operations for Long
Island Power Authority(LIPA) in January
2014,PSEG Long Island , immediately
identifi ed the successful merger of the IT
landscapes by consolidating the back offi ce IT
systems and organizational change management
(OCM) as a leading priority.
Partnering with Tata Consultancy Services
(TCS), a global leader in IT services, PSEG Long
Island planned and implemented a business
transformation program involving data migration,
testing, and change management. At the onset,
areas of improvements were identifi ed across
systems,business processes that would lead to an
enhanced cost management and an improved level
of customer service.
As a longstanding IT partner to PSEG, a publicly
traded diversifi ed energy company with annual
revenues of $11 billion and the parent company
to PSEG Long Island, TCS brought in a strong
understanding of the former’s ERP landscape.
‘PSEG Long Island and TCS developed a
successful partnership to provide Long Island
residents with a quick, effi cient ERP transition
enabling our operators to focus on optimizing
PSEG Long Island and TCS Successfully Undertake a Large Business Process Transformation Program to Consolidate Corporate Functions
By PSEG LI and TCS
focus communications on changing roles and
responsibilities, as well as the target operating
model. Holding regular town hall meetings,
publishing newsletters and conducting training
programs played a crucial role in driving
stakeholder acceptance.
With the support of an innovative framework,
the project went live as scheduled, with no
reported data migration-related defects after the
go-live stage.Moreover, mapping LIPA’s business
processes to PSEG Long Island’s proven electric
utility business model
brought in several
other benefi ts. These
include effi cient
storm management,
improved fi nancial
transparency and
integrity, better
regulatory compliance,
and increased
customer and
employee satisfaction.
In addition, the
human resources
function was able to
automate processes,
centralize reporting,
and integrate with
external applications.
Implementation of
standardized and
uniform project structure and migration resulted
in signifi cant cost reductions. Optimization
of inventory management activities and
implementation of work management processes
helped reduce costs further.
Program Highlights
• Catered to more than 3,000 users
• Addressed more than 1,500 requirements
• Conducted more than 400 workshops
and training sessions
• Tested more than 285 processes and
sub processes
“Working as a team,
PSEG Long Island, LIPA,
and TCS were able to
successfully drive a
complex, large-scale
business transforma-
tion program to create
a best-in-class, stable,
and reliable utility
organization.”
THOUGHT LEADERSHIP • SPONSORED BY TATA CONSULTANCY SERVICES THOUGHT LEADERSHIP • SPONSORED BY TATA CONSULTANCY SERVICES
X
X X
X
X
X
X
.5X.5X
Artwork provided. Please do not recreate.
Date : 31 I 01 I 2007Title : TCS Company Mark - Stacked - 3 linesDesign Magger : Gargi SharmaProject Co- ordinator : Vishal JhunjhunwalaColour : Pantone 2427 CSoftware Formats : CorelDraw 11, Adobe Illustrator CS2
IMPORTANT : COLOURS USED TO CREATE THIS MECHANICAL ARE FOR VISUAL SUGGESTION ONLY. USE PANTONE COLOUR SWATCHES TO MATCH FOR CORRECT COLOURS. EVEN THOUGH THIS MECHANICAL HAS BEEN CHECKED FOR ACCURACY, PLEASE DOUBLE CHECK PRIOR TO RELEASE TO THE VENDOR. IF INSTRUCTIONS ARE FOUND DEFICIENT, PLEASE CONTACT corporate.o�[email protected]
TCS Company Mark - Stacked - 3 linesFor use in 2D applications
Tata Consultancy Services Identity Guidelines I Jan 2007
Guide-sheet developed by Design Services, Corporate MarketingCopyright © 2007 Tata Consultancy Services Limited
“TCS partnered with PSEG Long Island to lead
the business transformation through a successful
ERP integration programme. We are very pleased
that we got this opportunity to help PSEG drive
operational excellence, ensure safe, affordable &
environmentally responsible energy supply to our
community besides driving customer experience”,
said Sudheer Warrier,VP & Global Head, TCS
Utilities Business.
The key takeaway stands out when evaluating
the success of this data migration and change
management project. And that is the fact that a
successful project is not just about harnessing
and delivering technology, but also about looking
at the big picture and working collaboratively to
bring in the required competencies. Working as
a team, PSEG Long Island, and TCS were able to
successfully drive a complex, large-scale business
transformation program to create a best-in-class,
stable, and reliable utility organization.
PSEG Long Island operates LIPA’s transmission
and distribution system under a 12-year contract
and serves 1.1 million customers across Long Island
and the Rockaways.
Vision and Goals of the Program
• Transform into a best in class & reliable utility organization
• Efficient cost management
• Integrated & scalable IT systems to support business needs
customer service and electric reliability’ said Joseph
Santamaria, Chief Information Offi cer, PSEG.
PSEG Long Island and TCS identifi ed
opportunities for modifi cation and enhancement
in specifi c ERP modules including fi nance,
supply chain management, human resources,
maintenance, and project systems. The
transformation program was then designed to
align LIPA’s business processes with those of
PSEG Long Island, including customer service,
payroll disbursement, profi tability and cost
management, and rate plan fi lling.
Introducing organizational change management
in the early stages of the project helped
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W.INTELLIGENTUTILITY.COM
31
Upon assuming operations for Long
Island Power Authority(LIPA) in January
2014,PSEG Long Island , immediately
identifi ed the successful merger of the IT
landscapes by consolidating the back offi ce IT
systems and organizational change management
(OCM) as a leading priority.
Partnering with Tata Consultancy Services
(TCS), a global leader in IT services, PSEG Long
Island planned and implemented a business
transformation program involving data migration,
testing, and change management. At the onset,
areas of improvements were identifi ed across
systems,business processes that would lead to an
enhanced cost management and an improved level
of customer service.
As a longstanding IT partner to PSEG, a publicly
traded diversifi ed energy company with annual
revenues of $11 billion and the parent company
to PSEG Long Island, TCS brought in a strong
understanding of the former’s ERP landscape.
‘PSEG Long Island and TCS developed a
successful partnership to provide Long Island
residents with a quick, effi cient ERP transition
enabling our operators to focus on optimizing
PSEG Long Island and TCS Successfully Undertake a Large Business Process Transformation Program to Consolidate Corporate Functions
By PSEG LI and TCS
focus communications on changing roles and
responsibilities, as well as the target operating
model. Holding regular town hall meetings,
publishing newsletters and conducting training
programs played a crucial role in driving
stakeholder acceptance.
With the support of an innovative framework,
the project went live as scheduled, with no
reported data migration-related defects after the
go-live stage.Moreover, mapping LIPA’s business
processes to PSEG Long Island’s proven electric
utility business model
brought in several
other benefi ts. These
include effi cient
storm management,
improved fi nancial
transparency and
integrity, better
regulatory compliance,
and increased
customer and
employee satisfaction.
In addition, the
human resources
function was able to
automate processes,
centralize reporting,
and integrate with
external applications.
Implementation of
standardized and
uniform project structure and migration resulted
in signifi cant cost reductions. Optimization
of inventory management activities and
implementation of work management processes
helped reduce costs further.
Program Highlights
• Catered to more than 3,000 users
• Addressed more than 1,500 requirements
• Conducted more than 400 workshops
and training sessions
• Tested more than 285 processes and
sub processes
“Working as a team,
PSEG Long Island, LIPA,
and TCS were able to
successfully drive a
complex, large-scale
business transforma-
tion program to create
a best-in-class, stable,
and reliable utility
organization.”
THOUGHT LEADERSHIP • SPONSORED BY TATA CONSULTANCY SERVICES THOUGHT LEADERSHIP • SPONSORED BY TATA CONSULTANCY SERVICES
X
X X
X
X
X
X
.5X.5X
Artwork provided. Please do not recreate.
Date : 31 I 01 I 2007Title : TCS Company Mark - Stacked - 3 linesDesign Magger : Gargi SharmaProject Co- ordinator : Vishal JhunjhunwalaColour : Pantone 2427 CSoftware Formats : CorelDraw 11, Adobe Illustrator CS2
IMPORTANT : COLOURS USED TO CREATE THIS MECHANICAL ARE FOR VISUAL SUGGESTION ONLY. USE PANTONE COLOUR SWATCHES TO MATCH FOR CORRECT COLOURS. EVEN THOUGH THIS MECHANICAL HAS BEEN CHECKED FOR ACCURACY, PLEASE DOUBLE CHECK PRIOR TO RELEASE TO THE VENDOR. IF INSTRUCTIONS ARE FOUND DEFICIENT, PLEASE CONTACT corporate.o�[email protected]
TCS Company Mark - Stacked - 3 linesFor use in 2D applications
Tata Consultancy Services Identity Guidelines I Jan 2007
Guide-sheet developed by Design Services, Corporate MarketingCopyright © 2007 Tata Consultancy Services Limited
“TCS partnered with PSEG Long Island to lead
the business transformation through a successful
ERP integration programme. We are very pleased
that we got this opportunity to help PSEG drive
operational excellence, ensure safe, affordable &
environmentally responsible energy supply to our
community besides driving customer experience”,
said Sudheer Warrier,VP & Global Head, TCS
Utilities Business.
The key takeaway stands out when evaluating
the success of this data migration and change
management project. And that is the fact that a
successful project is not just about harnessing
and delivering technology, but also about looking
at the big picture and working collaboratively to
bring in the required competencies. Working as
a team, PSEG Long Island, and TCS were able to
successfully drive a complex, large-scale business
transformation program to create a best-in-class,
stable, and reliable utility organization.
PSEG Long Island operates LIPA’s transmission
and distribution system under a 12-year contract
and serves 1.1 million customers across Long Island
and the Rockaways.
Vision and Goals of the Program
• Transform into a best in class & reliable utility organization
• Efficient cost management
• Integrated & scalable IT systems to support business needs
customer service and electric reliability’ said Joseph
Santamaria, Chief Information Offi cer, PSEG.
PSEG Long Island and TCS identifi ed
opportunities for modifi cation and enhancement
in specifi c ERP modules including fi nance,
supply chain management, human resources,
maintenance, and project systems. The
transformation program was then designed to
align LIPA’s business processes with those of
PSEG Long Island, including customer service,
payroll disbursement, profi tability and cost
management, and rate plan fi lling.
Introducing organizational change management
in the early stages of the project helped
Tata TL.indd All Pages 10/7/15 1:49 PM
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IT INSIGHTS
WE HEAR A LOT THESE DAYS ABOUT THE DEATH OF THE UTILITY BUSINESS MODEL. WHAT IS CON EDISON DOING TO NOT JUST WEATHER THE DISRUP-
TION BUT TO THRIVE? KETSCHKE: First, we’re not looking at it as a disruption, but as an opportunity.
People have an increasing number of choices regarding how they get their energy. Now they can produce it more cost effectively than ever before. New technology and innovation are inevitable. It changes the way businesses and customers interact.
New technology is reshaping everything; at Con Edison, we see optimization of the grid as the key to unlocking true value.
The role of a traditional T&D company like Con Edison is changing. The po-tential and value of new, customer-driven technologies is robust. We will clear the path for that.
Utilities provide the interconnection to share and balance resources capable of meeting customer requirements even if a customer’s own sources are not available or export extra power when they make more than they need. A reliable grid is re-quired to optimize distributed resources like solar. We have to be available to either supplement a customer’s daily needs, or provide 100 percent of what they need.
The grid must remain reliable and affordable for all. Con Edison is working with thousands of customers installing solar, battery storage and DG. Customers can supply or access power back and forth from our grid. A cost accompanies that in either direction.
Questions remain: Are there ways to aggregate community solar or other renewables so that renters or low-income families can receive proportional ben-efits from new technologies? Will new revenue streams or savings derive from the use of additional data that technological tools will give us? We’re continuing to work on the possibilities.
Of one thing, we’re certain: Continuing and evolving technology has always affected our industry, and always will.
IN THIS INDUSTRY, WE TALKED ABOUT SMART GRID A DECADE AGO. WE TALKED ABOUT THE CONVERGENCE OF IT & OT FIVE YEARS AGO. NOW WE’RE ALL ABOUT THE INTERNET OF THINGS. HOW’S THAT EVOLUTION REFLECTED WITHIN CON EDISON?
KETSCHKE: The Internet of Things is another evolutionary technological devel-opment and will lead to leveraging all sorts of new data to help optimize operation of a reliable grid. The two-way data and information flow between customers and utilities is an exciting development, and we welcome the vast potential it presents.
WHAT’S NEXT AFTER THE INTERNET OF THINGS? WHAT’S COMING THAT UTILITIES MAY FACE NEXT?
KETSCHKE: No one can say with certainty what’s next, but what’s happening today is far different from earlier eras in energy delivery.
Devices like remote thermostats allow us to reduce demand when necessary; software developers are giving us new ways of managing technical aspects
of our business as well as customer relationships.
We’ve only explored the tip of this iceberg. Tremendous opportunities to operate more efficiently and more effectively will present themselves, making optimal effective management of the varied stakeholder interests and relationships key to our progress.
One of the things we do know is that we will have more and more data, with the ability to slice and dice it any number of ways. It will become cheaper and cheaper, and our ability to analyze and utilize it will become bet-ter and better as time goes on.
DEMAND MANAGEMENT, DEMAND RESPONSE AND ENERGY EFFICIENCY ALL HAVE THE INTERESTING GOAL OF HAVING YOUR CUSTOMERS USE LESS OF YOUR PRODUCT. SO, WHY HOP ON THE BANDWAGON, AND HOW DOES THAT FIT INTO CON EDISON’S VISION OF THE FUTURE?
KETSCHKE: Our mission and respon-sibility begins with keeping the lights on, but in today’s world, it’s really about delivering and channeling elec-tricity. It’s no longer volumetric sales; it’s the value of a reliable connection that can go back and forth between the customer and the grid.
Thirty years ago, bankers started becoming retailers; the way the banking industry served the customer changed. That’s what’s happening here. The new goal can’t be about sales volume—it’s about bringing the opportunity that our new energy future provides to the door-steps of all our customers, whether they put solar panels on their roofs or not.
ConEdisontalksdeath,dataanddisruptions
+An interview with Matthew Ketschke
“What’s happening
today is far different
from earlier eras in
energy delivery.”
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WE SAT DOWN for a chat with Marty Edwards, director of the Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team (ICS-
CERT) with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) about one of the big-gest threats to utilities today and in the future—security in the Internet of Things (IoT) world.
WHAT IS THE POWER INDUSTRY DOING RIGHT WHEN IT COMES TO CYBERSECURITY?EDWARDS: The power subset of the energy industry specifically is probably the
most mature when it comes to industrial sectors as far as cybersecurity goes. Your level of understanding—and the investment level—continues to rise. Those are the positives.
WHAT’S IT DOING WRONG?EDWARDS: While the level of awareness is good, there are isolated cases of
companies and groups that I don’t think take the nature of the threat or the
Demand response and energy ef-ficiency measures have been around a long time. They promote reliability and save customers and shareholders money by deferring more expensive billion-dollar investments in substa-tions for additional years.
The questions we face have to do with leveraging what’s available to us in ways that make the most sense for all the people we serve. How can we best facilitate incorporating more renew-able energy from customers and have it benefit all who are served by the grid? The business model will evolve, and the value of the grid will be enhanced.
YOU’RE BRINGING ON A LOT OF SMART METERS IN THE NEAR FUTURE. WHAT ARE THE PLANS FOR THE DATA DELUGE YOU’LL GET? IN WHAT WAYS DOES ALL THAT DATA EXCITE YOU? IN WHAT WAYS DOES IT SCARE YOU?
KETSCHKE: We’ve taken initial steps and have been encouraged to proceed with steps needed for installing smart meters throughout our service area. It’s a key element in everything we’ve been talking about, facilitating enhanced service and reliability information, the two-way flow of energy, demand reduc-tion, cost-savings, and harnessing of more data for ensuring a more resilient and reliable grid. The data generated promises to yield both operational and statistical value, providing technical benefits for us, and useful information and savings opportunities for customers.
WHAT LESSONS HAVE YOU PERSONALLY LEARNED FROM YOUR TIME WITH CON EDISON, AND HOW HAVE YOU APPLIED THOSE LESSONS?
KETSCHKE: I’ve been working at Con Edison 20 years, and if I’ve learned one thing, it’s that change is constant. I’ve learned to welcome it. It’s what any inventor, including Thomas Edison, would have embraced. The bottom line is this: We live in an innovative world; technology is giving people what they want, providing tremendous
benefits unimaginable only a short time ago. If customers are driving the change, as they are now, you must accept and encourage it, while doing your best to be on the front end of it.
FROM CON EDISON’S EXPERIENCE OVER THE YEARS, WHAT ADVICE WOULD YOU GIVE OTHER UTILITIES REALLY STRUGGLING WITH ALL OF THESE INDUSTRY CHANGES AND BUSINESS MODEL DISRUPTIONS?
KETSCHKE: Just look at your iPhone. Did customers know they wanted that? Before Thomas Edison, did people know they wanted the electric light? It’s up to our industry leaders to know and understand our business, its possibilities, market needs, expanding horizons, political realities, and stakeholder concerns. It’s up to our industry leaders to effectively address them.
Matthew Ketschke is vice president of distributed resource integration at Con Edison.
DirecttalkfromtheDHSoncybersecurity
+An interview with the head of ICS-CERT
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seriousness of the threat landscape importantly enough. Although the industry in general has good aware-ness, there are still some isolated cases of ignorance. They just plain don’t pay enough attention. Work on situation awareness, I’d say.
IS EARLY PREP STUFF, SUCH AS WHITELISTING, REALLY WORTH THE EFFORT?
EDWARDS: Whitelisting is a specific technical solution for specific mal-ware—locking down apps on an end de-vice. It has proved itself very worthy in the general IT space, but one of the chal-lenges in the operational control systems space, is that whitelisting requires you to work very closely with all the vendors involved. You could have problems if whitelisting is not executed properly, and those problems could create issues worse than the malware you were trying to protect yourself from. So, it’s certainly not a silver bullet or panacea.
IS THERE A SILVER BULLET?EDWARDS: No. That’s one of the key
takeaways here: Cybersecurity is a life-style, not a diet. Cybersecurity requires you to change personnel, behavior, policies and practices. It’s a com-plete program. There’s no snake-oil salesman with a magic black box for your network or a magic application. There’s nothing that can fix everything for all time. Cybersecurity must be maintained and evaluated continu-ously as the threats change.
HOW CAN THE POWER INDUSTRY AND DHS WORK TOGETHER?
EDWARDS: I encourage all the readers to sign up with the ICS-CERT alerts and advisories in our secure portal. Any industry person with a role in security can receive this reporting that helps identify concerns.
[Editor’s note: Information on how to join the secure portal can be found online at https://ics-cert.us-cert.gov/Related-Sites.]
THE MOST POPULAR THEME IN THIS AREA FOR UTILITIES IS: COMPLIANCE DOESN’T EQUAL SECURITY. WHAT’S YOUR TAKE ON THAT?
EDWARDS: Philosophically, I’ll agree with that. In a compliance-based solution or audit, you’re basically in a race to the bottom to document the minimum level of acceptable performance. Once you’ve met that and checked the right boxes on the form, you can claim success. Most of the time, you need to take a holistic risk-based approach. Answer these questions: What’s most important to the bottom-line of my business? What’s the statistical chance? How much do I have to spend to buy down that risk? You’ll make stronger improvements answering these questions and acting, rather than just trying to meet the compliance of an auditor.
That being said, North American Energy Reliability Corporation’s Critical Infrastructure Protection guidelines (NERC CIP) have raised the bar with what the minimum cyber “hygiene practices” are. We have raised the overall cyber ecosystem, but that doesn’t mean that the compliance methodology is enough. You get out of it what you put into it.
WHAT AREAS ARE WE IGNORING THAT WE SHOULD FOCUS ON?EDWARDS: One item that keeps cropping up when we do our assessments is the
continued desire—for a variety of business reasons—to provide Internet con-nectivity to industrial devices. Perhaps you want remote engineering access or need a subcontractor to monitor for performance. Whatever the reason, there’s a continued evolution of these systems becoming more Internet-connected. But people are not spending enough due diligence in making sure those connec-tions are secure. We have people submit to us literally hundreds of thousands of devices accessible through the Internet, and some still have default passwords in place. These systems are often interconnected and with a poor security posture. That needs more attention.
WHAT AREAS ARE WE FOCUSED ON THAT WE’D BE BETTER TO IGNORE (OR AT LEAST MAKE LESS IMPORTANT)?
EDWARDS: Don’t outright ignore anything. Focus on what’s important for you in your specific environment. But, in a lot of cases industry—and this is not unique to power—tends to get hung up on attribution. You’re too interested in who the threat actor is rather than why that type of actor is a threat. We tend to have this attribution dialogue a lot, which doesn’t benefit anyone. If we just generalize the attribution elements and say, “this is a sophisticated threat” and leave it at that, we could move forward faster to move into the triage stage.
If you respond to a trauma, you want to treat the patient first rather than worrying about who did this. First things first: Take the right steps to get the patient stable.
WHAT ADVICE WOULD YOU GIVE THE POWER INDUSTRY AND POWER UTILITIES AS THEY PREP FOR MORE COMPLICATED AND MORE PREVALENT CYBERSECURITY PROBLEMS?
EDWARDS: The most beneficial advice I have is: Invest in your people. All too often we get hung up on the fact that cybersecurity is technical. We see com-panies that have spent tons on whiz-bang tools but these great tools are run by people with other priorities. You get hung up on that technical—the latest systems and devices. But, first and foremost, you can make much better progress spending your budget on hiring quality talent. Then let that talent digest the risk environment and work with the C-suite to come up with the right plans and pro-cedures. Tech will be a part of that plan, but it’s not the first step. The first step is getting solid human capital in place.
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YOU’VE WINKED ON YOUR PHONE. You know you have. You’ve wondered who in the world is using those emojis that illustrate tap-dancing twins and animals in party hats. You’ve marveled at the novels “translated” into
emoji. You’ve even watched that video on YouTube where Bill Nye explains science in emoji. (Well, technically, Bill Nye explains science and a graphics guy adds some emoji later. Still, its fun.)
So, here at Intelligent Utility, we thought it would be a fun addition to our tech head issue if we attempted—in Bill Nye fashion, because we’re fans—to explain the evolution of the grid in emoji (using the basic definitions of each stage as de-fined, basically, by the all-knowing Wikipedia).
So, let’s start at the beginning, when there was no grid.
Then there was a grid.
Then there was a wait where stuff just sort of chugged along like always.
Then there was smart grid where the hardware stuff got, well, smarter.
Then there was an IT/OT convergence where the silos disappeared and those departments, supposedly, packed up and moved in together.
Now there is the Internet of Things, the dawning of a new era of actionable data.
Any questions?
Theevolutionofthegridinemoji
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THE FUTURE IS a more desirable place to be in the energy world when raw data becomes actionable insight. The functional silos that govern
America’s power industry are dissipating as utilities and end users derive new value from a changing system of power generation and delivery. Today, big data and analytics are helping drive the change. While you’d be challenged to find a more overused buzzword in technology, analytics are a utility’s best friend in today’s world of energy conservation and fast-shifting customer preferences.
“If you want to talk about the future of utility data, you really need to be look-ing at the future of the utility,” said Carol Stimmel, founder and CEO of Manifest Mind, a sustainable energy consulting practice. As consumers and businesses engage in more self-generation and storage, the lines between power generation and consumption are blurring. Real value comes not just from collecting the right metrics around voltage levels, potential outages or new inflows of electrons onto the grid but from the ability to actuate change.
The concept of analytics isn’t without precedent at most utilities today. Utilities have used analytics to fine-tune internal operations but less so when it comes to direct customer interactions. “Analytics has been done for years to manage high-voltage transmission safely, but more focus on the use of sensors after the
major outages in 2003. Until recently, analytics really hasn’t been available on the secondary side, and there’s been little visibility close to the home,” said Stimmel. “The business model of mak-ing more money by delivering more electrons is changing—what utilities must do is to adapt their perspective from wires to services and systems, and focus on deriving value from the relationships enabled by the distrib-uted grid itself.”
With so much opportunity, how does the power industry track and act on the right metrics? It’s about proactively sensing change by looking at variables in a different way. Transformer load management, voltage variation, and even how social media streams might be trending regarding an impending storm can factor in to how a utility should measure and act on system changes. From Stimmel’s view, power grid analytics are about outcomes that are driven by “outliers and surprising combinations of data, like a twitter stream mashed to super storm activ-ity.” Analytics can be used to react to
increasing rooftop solar programs, and how that affects conservation pro-grams. Or even non-technical losses and differentiating between customers unlawfully taking electricity vs. those simply using less of it.
Then it’s about choosing vendors that understand technology and data science but also know the energy industry and what the world looks
+How do we get there? By Areg Bagdasarian
“With so much
opportunity, how does
the power industry
track and act on the
right metrics?”
utility data
The
of
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UTILITIES HAVE INVESTED billions of dollars over the last five years in technologies designed to operate the electric grid more efficiently,
reliably, safely, and cost-effectively. As deployment of smart grid infrastructure reaches an inflection point, utility executives are faced with the difficult task of determining how to best make use of the data generated by intelligent devices to drive business benefits. In many cases, utility analytics have been the key to un-locking this hidden value, there are examples of utilities recovering half the costs of their smart grid programs by detecting and preventing energy theft. Other companies are reporting improvements in service reliability of over 35 percent, enabled in part by the deployment of sophisticated analytical capabilities.
With more than 60 utility smart grid analytics use cases in existence, choos-ing a starting point for implementing an analytics program that optimizes value across the enterprise can be a daunting task, and there have been many lessons learned from early adopters. Some early adopters have undertaken ambitious initiatives focused on implementing big data applications without a well-defined data analytics road map, resulting in a significantly delayed return on invest-ment. Conversely, other more conservative utilities have been more surgical, deploying one-off applications, which ultimately leave money on the table.
Therefore, creating a business case for analytics requires a methodology that transcends the technological and operational considerations of the utility, as well as one which can be easily articulated to key decision makers.
How do you do it?
1. TAKE INVENTORY. The first step in determining the best way to utilize recently deployed
infrastructure is by conducting an assessment of the use-case capabilities (people, process, technology) that have already been deployed. During this
like under distributed generation. Vendors that espouse interoperable platforms are preferred because they can adapt to change over the long-term. After all, utility operations can differ significantly from one another. “There are over 3,000 utilities in the U.S., yet people think solutions can be cookie cutter, but that couldn’t be further from the truth,” said Stimmel. “What’s different in Texas as far as air conditioning load is different from Vermont. Differences in commu-nication, meters, geographies—for example, you can’t easily put a wireless mesh in the middle of the plains because of technical limitations. There are often is as much uniqueness as there are similarities.”
Though utility adoption of analyt-ics may still be in its formative stages, combining the right elements for managing new grid data is already beginning to pay off. Strong gains are being made in how to segment and engage more deeply with customers. That translates into more successful efficiency programs and more insight into what consumers and businesses really need, according to Stimmel.
Going forward, utilities that use analytics to align their infrastructure and vendor choices with end user needs will ensure their future viability.
“Those that have the ingredients now for energy intelligence and know how to apply it to the energy problem, must work with trusted vendors that have the right vision and platform for advanced analytics and the ability to rapidly adapt their models, so they can scale quickly as challenges shift and change,” said Stimmel.
Indeed many of the questions that analytics will answer have yet to be asked, but having the right compo-nents in place will make it easier to iteratively reconfigure systems as op-posed to making painful last-minute investments just to keep up with the incoming grid data of the future.
Unlockingthenextgenofsmartgridbenefits
+Here’s a hint: analytics involvedBy Zach Pollack and David Groake
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phase, it is also important to gain an understanding of the high-priority use cases, as well as those that, which may not be relevant given the operat-ing characteristics of the utility. This initial survey should also be used to identify the functional domains (e.g., grid analytics, customer analytics) upon which to focus future work-shops, strategy sessions and data requests. A market scan of peer utilities, similar markets and relevant vendors should be conducted as well.
Note: Use cases focused on energy effi-ciency and conservation are typically unattractive in states without revenue decoupling.
2. PRIORITIZE USE CASES AND CREATEA ROAD MAP FOCUSED ON ROI.
Prioritization must take into consid-eration the overall value (return on in-vestment), ease of implementation and the speed at which benefits accrue.
By mapping value vs. implementation effort, one can rapidly understand the quick wins, long-term investments and unattractive initiatives that should be deferred indefinitely. Additionally, many use cases have inherent affinity (such as reliability and asset management) and tend to be enabled by the same key pro-cess redesigns, organizational changes, applications and data sources.
Therefore, use cases should be assessed and prioritized holistically, taking into account any affinity and codependent value drivers. It is also critical that the analytics road map be periodically refreshed as applica-tions are enabled, new investments are made or new use cases emerge.
Note: Creating a reporting dashboard can be a quick win resulting in a one-time or short-term benefit that re-quires minimal implementation effort. Equally, leveraging sensor data for use cases such as distribution automa-tion and fault location isolation and
service restoration (FLISR) to enable predictive control can be a more complex, long-term undertaking but ultimately yields greater, continuous benefits.
3. CREATE A DESIGN THAT TARGETS KEY BUSINESS CASES.Understanding the value and ease of implementation as relative rank-
ings can be helpful for targeting key business cases to investigate further. However, a more thorough business process based cost-benefit analysis is typically required. The cost-benefit analysis and business case should explore all benefits including traditional bottom line benefits, as well as those that may accrue to customers and more intangible benefits, such as improved regulatory relations.
Note: While some benefits can be easily quantified and/or monetized (such as avoided costs due to labor efficiencies) other benefits may not be, but are nev-ertheless important in today’s customer-centric regulatory environment (e.g., customer satisfaction scores).
4. MEASURE AND VALIDATE THE BENEFITS.The final step in any analytics program is measuring and validating the
benefits outlined in the initial business case. Apart from evaluating progress for internal budgeting purposes, transparency into benefits realization has become a common requirement of regulators, particularly around use cases that have tangible customer impacts such as reliability and resiliency measures. The key to realizing true benefits is putting in place effective structures and processes for governance, identifying and verifying benefits owners, as well as clearly articulat-ing any methodologies used in the calculation of the benefits.
Note: Much like the analytics road map, benefits realization is a dynamic process and must be updated as organizational and technology changes occur.
The benefits of utility analytics are no longer theoretical; there are now a growing number of real examples of what utility companies have achieved. Half of the recovery costs of BC Hydro’s smart meter program will be found in detect-ing and preventing energy theft. PPL Electric has reported a 38 percent improve-ment in service reliability enabled in part by the deployment of sophisticated analytical capabilities. Oklahoma Gas & Electric, in a bid to substantially shed load by 2020, is using customer analytics to gain visibility on individual custom-ers’ responses to price signals. This is enabling them to identify the best custom-ers to target with specific marketing campaigns.
In each of these cases, clear strategic goals or business problems have been addressed by using a combination of analytical solutions. Utilities have made significant investments in intelligent infrastructure; as the first wave of smart grid deployments nears completion, it has become clear that analytics is the key to unlocking additional value for utilities, shareholders and customers. With the right framework and road map in place, utility analytics offers the ability to turn the smart grid from theory into practice, seizing the opportunity to improve service, reduce costs and increase reliability.
Zach Pollock and David Groake work at PA Consulting. Pollock, a consultant, has authored several reports on grid modernization initiatives. Groake, an energy sector consultant, has led smart grid and strategic technology deployments at large utilities.
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BY THE NUMBERS
WE LAST SPOKE to Anne Pramaggiore, president and CEO of Chicago utility ComEd, exactly one year ago to the day from this chat, an interest-
ing coincidence—or perhaps we were responding to an internal need to catch up with one of our favorite industry executives.
In 2014, we talked specifically about the utility’s icebox derby, an annual event to promote STEM efforts for girls. So, we checked in during this chat on the results from this year’s race, which, like last year, saw 30 girls competing in six different teams. The ComEd engineers joined in to mentor again, along with area college students across many science disciplines. And, as always, it wasn’t about who won but about the learning process.
“Last year, the derby was more intellectual,” Pramaggiore said. “This year, it was more hands-on. We’re really trying to give the girls applied experience related to science and math, to get them immersed in it.”
And speaking of being immersed in science, ComEd is a local expert in the area. They’ve been the city’s electric utility for over 100 years, which has required a lot of evolution in both technology and community engagement. We asked Pramaggiore how her utility would continue that evolution.
She pointed to the utility’s work in smart grid and modernization that began after the Illinois General Assembly passed the legislation in 2011.
“Over the past four years, we’ve added digital intelligence to the grid. We’ve added smart meters, distribution automation, and intelligent substations with
predictive analytics. Now we’re excited about intelligent sensors in both the substation and meter that will allow us to see voltage levels on a feeder and help us manage that voltage more tightly,” she summarized.
She added that ComEd is studying how to best use all this smart tech to truly give the customer the best power experience. They started with a focus on enhancing reliability—which they accomplished with some of the best years on record in 2013 and 2014—and are now examining how to get the “next wave” of benefits.
That smart tech and that new focus on the customer have pushed ComEd into a “utility of the future” rethink-ing—understanding where they want to be and just how to get there with changing technology and policy re-quirements. In fact, they’ve got a team to figure this vision out, Pramaggiore noted. And that vision, at this point, has no less than three networks.
“We are in a position, as a utility, to provide substantial benefits to custom-ers in the future through the physical grid that we all know and love, the digital network that we run AMI me-ters on, and also the social network—the notion that, as utilities, we have unparalleled access to consumers. We touch everyone in our service terri-tory, and we can access them through multiple channels. If we can find a way to utilize all three networks, that’s the future,” she said.
Getting to the point where all three of those networks work harmoni-ously, though, that’s the hard part—“there is a lot of work to be done,” as Pramaggiore commented. One part of that vision they’re working on is partnerships, with ComEd being a sort of choreographer around new projects and technology.
And ComEd already plays that choreographer function now—at least to a small extent. Some future-vision pilots are already in place, including a community microgrid in development
CatchingupwithAnnePramaggiore
+Talking with ComEd’s prez on derbys, details & the death spiral
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OUT THE DOOR
A LOT OF LITTLE BOYS AND GIRLS DREAM of being firefighters or police officers or even utility linemen when they grow up, Evan Suboticki
was a lucky dreamer. He got to realize that dream and be that lineman for FirstEnergy. He never realized, however, that this dream job came along with a second one—namely, being a model.
Not for Calvin Klein or Tommy Hilfiger. That’s small potatoes. Suboticki made the big time: He got to be a bobblehead model.
At a late March Cleveland Cavaliers home game, FirstEnergy gave out a slew of NBA player Kevin Love bobbleheads—about 20,000, according to Christy Hajoway, who does social media communications at FirstEnergy.
But the best bobblehead gift came at halftime when some lucky fans responded to a message flashed on the giant video scoreboard telling them to send a text to re-ceive one of only 50 FirstEnergy lineman bobbleheads based on Suboticki’s likeness.
“Using the lineman bobblehead was part of our promotion at this season’s Cavs games to thank our linemen ‘hometown heroes’ and to recognize the hundreds of workers within our company who maintain thousands of miles of lines every day to provide reliable electricity for our customers,” said Gretchan Sekulich, vice president of communications and marketing for FirstEnergy.
Still, that one face that represents those hundreds of workers is Suboticki’s.Suboticki is officially a line leader at FirstEnergy’s Ohio Edison utility line
shop in Medina, Ohio, near Akron. His official bobblehead reflects many of his job’s details: a tool belt, flame-retardant shirt, safety gloves and even spikes on the shoes—and, yes, the ultimate lineman accessory, a pole.
Amodelact +FirstEnergy lineman gets his own bobblehead
that Pramaggiore considers her favor-ite since it really reflects a microcosm of the area, a smart meter data pilot, clean energy testing, storage work and even smart street lights (as part of the microgrid project).
In fact, ComEd just got some DOE money to design a controller to help two microgrids work in tandem—something that hasn’t been done before.
With all these new projects and ideas in play, the one thing that doesn’t seem to phase ComEd or Pramaggiore is the changing business model for utilities, sometimes referred to as the “death spiral.” Rather than focus on negatives, however, she talked, instead, about building the energy platform needed for the digital economy, which is still heavily reliant on the grid itself.
“Much of every industry’s future will derive from the network functionality of the power grid. Given the indis-pensability of the power grid—the ultimate network—to borrow from Mark Twain: reports of its death are greatly exaggerated,” she said.
Pramaggiore sees a shift in defini-tions at utilities and, in the future, ComEd sees a growth in services, which will require some changes in regulation if items like energy effi-ciency (EE) will now become an asset.
“If EE is going to be a bigger part of the pie, we should treat it as a true utility function,” she said. “We recently proposed additional EE and voltage options be treated as regulatory assets in legislation.” Whether that will get the go ahead, though, remains to be seen, though she did advise all utilities to have faith in the regulatory community, since she’s seen them have real enthusi-asm about helping utilities evolve.
“We’ve got challenges, and we don’t take them lightly,” she added. “But this is a tremendous opportunity. The value that we can unlock is amazing. Network economies and network value are where we’re going to find the future.”
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Suboticki feels very strongly that he is representing all of the exceptional FirstEnergy linemen. He doesn’t take that lightly. And he’s pretty happy with his bobblehead mini self.
“Being selected to be the face of the FirstEnergy lineman bobblehead has been a fun and unique experience,” he said. “I am very proud to represent FirstEnergy and all lineman for the hard work, dedication, and sacrifices we make to deliver reliable power to our communities. The best part about
being selected to be the bobblehead was showing it to my kids and having them ask why my head was so big and why was I wearing lipstick!”
How did Suboticki get selected for such an honor? Did he have to audi-tion? Did he wait for hours in a single position like the model for the Mona Lisa? Well, not exactly.
Apparently, he heard the powers that be at FirstEnergy were looking for a “model” from a friend who said, en-couragingly, “Dude, you look like a line-man. So, you should send in a photo.”
And so he did, and the rest is, well, Cleveland Cavaliers history—to be on
display at the National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum when it opens in Milwaukee in 2016. (It’s still in development.)
According to Hajoway, the reaction to the lineman bobblehead has been overwhelming. She added that one recently sold on eBay for over $100. And that response was how the museum curators heard about it in the first place. So, in May at yet another Cavs game, Suboticki presented an autographed bobblehead to Pedro Avalos, a representative from the National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum, who will ensure it gets to the Bobblehead Hall “for enshrinement” and for Suboticki’s fame to live on.
While FirstEnergy doesn’t currently have other promos running quite as unique as the bobblehead giveaway, they are definitely proud of this one.
“We have sure gotten a lot of mileage from this promotion and it has been great to honor all of our linemen,” said Mark Durbin, manager of energy delivery and state communications at FirstEnergy. “Our traditional and social media efforts were fun to do, and it resulted in the people from the Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum reaching out to us.”
And it resulted in us reaching out as well—though in no way are we half as much fun as a slot in the National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum. We admit that. We’re honest.
“In the end this was a great opportunity to promote the FirstEnergy brand, but more importantly it reminded us just how strong the connection is between our lineman and the customers they serve at our 10 utilities,” added Sekulich.
As for Suboticki, he answered my one last burning bobblehead question: Did he get one?
Yes, he did. He got a few, in fact. One for each of his kids, one for his wife’s fourth grade classroom—hey there, Mrs. Suboticki’s kids—and one, of course, for his mother.
And with his bobblehead fame slowly fading, Suboticki can now return to his favorite part of his job—saving your power in an emergency.
“The teamwork, on-the-job engineering and problem-solving that takes place when you’re the first responder after a storm makes me proud to be a lineman,” he said.
Now that seems exactly the response you’d expect from the man selected to represent all linemen at FirstEnergy: In the end, it’s not about him. It’s all about the customer.
But, still, we’d bet money his mother puts that bobblehead in a place of honor just like the National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum.
It’s not every day, after all, that your son gets his own bobblehead.
“Being the face of the
bobblehead has been a
unique experience.”
TECH HEAD ISSUE
VOL 7, ISSUE 4 » WINTER 2015
®
AN ENERGY CENTRAL PUBLICATION
» WWW.INTELLIGENTUTILITY.COM
THE ANNUAL
