GE Digital Energy field tests mobile outage app - Makes predictions based on partial outage data

 
ROCKVILLE, Md. - Sept. 30, 2015 - PRLog -- GE Digital Energy's new mobile damage-assessment app could shave one to two days from a two-week, major storm-related outage – saving utilities millions of dollars, John Chisum, utility product line leader for GE Digital Energy, told Smart Grid Today – the leading independent, daily, professional news journal of the smart grid industry – recently in an exclusive interview. Smart Grid Today publisher Modern Markets Intelligence Inc. is sharing the story here, free of charge.

The app was released in February, according to the GE website, and this interview was our first inquiry into what it offers utilities that use it.

"Using this application, a utility can start inspecting things in the field a day earlier after a major storm or other event than they could using traditional logistic systems," Chisum said. "Putting people in the field a day earlier can cut days off recovery time and save multi-millions of dollars."

For a major hurricane, a full restore might take 14 days without using the app, he added. "If we can restore them in 12 days, we can save the utility millions in revenue stream and the cost of foreign crews."

"Workers can be out in the field as soon as it is safe," Chisum said. "This could be within hours of the storm passing, based on safety conditions. A utility could have repair crews staged in a safe location with the app downloaded so as soon as conditions are safe, they could be sent into the field immediately," he added.

This app offers a simple user interface, a GPS feature and works on any popular mobile device – not just those owned by the utility, Chisum said. During major storm recoveries, mutual-assistance crewmembers from other utilities can download the app onto their own devices, he added.

As crews check for damage and enter new information, the GPS can identify their location.

Although the app will work with legacy meters, smart meters enhance the performance of the app by offering more real-time data, thus restoring power faster, Chisum said.

The cost to the utility is expected to cost about $1 million for a utility with a million smart meters, Chisum said, though the firm believes he savings from a single major outage could offset the investment. The firm considered a shared-risk model of pricing, where the utility would pay based on how much money the app saved after a storm.

"If you were able to pull one to three days off that event, what would that be worth to you?" he said. "They might save tens of millions of dollars.

"That risk-sharing model could be much more profitable to GE," but utilities might not have been happy with the bill, Brian Friehauf, GE Digital Energy asset management product line leader, told us. "That's the tricky part. That's why we went with a more traditional pricing model."

Two utilities are field-testing the app to let GE further refine it, Friehauf said. Five utilities expressed interest, but the technology firm limited the rollout and the two do not want to be named at this stage, he added.

GE expects to offer the app more widely by the end of this year, he added.

Many utilities still use manual, paper-based processes, requiring data-entry at the home office to evaluate damage after an outage, Chisum noted.

"Probably 75% of utilities are still gathering data manually to some extent, even if they have a mobile solution for their own staff, because they don't have devices to give to outside contractors," he added. "If you're doing it on paper in the field, a lot of the information has to be re-entered in the office.

"Anybody coming into the area to assist can use the device they brought with them," he added.

With other apps, when the mutual-assistance people show up, the utility need needs to give them a laptop and credentials and teach them how to use the app. That this is not always a smooth process as some foreign crews are resistant to using another utility's system.

GE has an older mobile app but use of it has been limited to a utility's own employees, Friehauf said. "Crews could download information onto their specific devices, but we couldn't leverage the devices to mutual-assistance crews.

"It was a tool useful to utilities but it stayed within the utility's boundaries. This [new app] allows us to perform a much better damage triage assessment."

This story was originally published in Smart Grid Today on September 8, 2015 and has been slightly edited for this format.

To read the full article, please visit http://www.smartgridtoday.com/public/GE-Digital-Energy-fi....

To read more articles like this one, sign up for a free trial to Smart Grid Today here: https://www.smartgridtoday.com/public/14day-Free-Trial.cf....

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the publication of record for the smart grid industry since 2009, delivers daily, unbiased, comprehensive and original reporting on emerging trends, applications and policies driving the modern utility industry. Our signature format features highly concise and easy-to-understand news copy based on trusted reporting, exclusive interviews, informed analysis and strategic insights that our subscribers rely on to succeed every business day. Modern Markets Intelligence Inc publishes Smart Grid Today.

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