Electric Energy T&D - Index

Electric Energy T&D - EE Magazine March / April 2009 - Index

Power outages, whether large or small, can range from a mere
inconvenience to a matter of life or death. Outages are almost always
unplanned events, but electric utilities have a responsibility to their
customers to provide reliable service, no matter the circumstance. During
an outage, the customer is interested in getting the lights back on, and
is not concerned with the “how” and “why” of the situation. The main
question is how, even in the face of disaster, can the utility meet customer
demands and safely, quickly and efficiently respond to outages?
A modern outage management system can help a utility overcome these
challenges and operate more efficiently even in the worst of situations.
For a utility to effectively operate in today’s evolving industry it is critical
to employ a solution that helps streamline crew management, safeguard
workers and the public, improve restoration time and efficiency, enhance
customer service, enable better maintenance management, monitor
network performance and reduce the costs, risks, and uncertainty involved
in energy distribution; a tall order, to say the least.
As a not-for-profit electric distribution utility with about 50,000 members,
Mid-Carolina Electric Cooperative (MCEC), which is headquartered in
Keeping the Lights on in
Central South Carolina:
How Mid-Carolina Electric
Cooperative Improved Service with
Outage Management Technology
By Keith Sturkie, VP of Information Technology
and Lee Ayers, System Engineer
Mid-Carolina Electric Cooperative
keith Sturkie Lee ayers
about mcEc: Mid-Carolina Electric Cooperative (MCEC) is an electric distribution
cooperative serving the midlands of South Carolina. The cooperative is headquartered
in Lexington, SC with a branch office in the northwest Columbia town of Irmo. MCEC
has 141 full and part time employees and a nine-member board of directors.
Lexington, S.C., needed an efficient and effective way to accelerate
outage response and restoration. MCEC also wanted to improve and
enhance worker and public safety, improve network reliability, reduce
outage durations and increase member satisfaction. In 00 , the utility’s
outdated outage management system was unable to handle current
demands due to a lack of updates and support by the vendor. It was also
based upon AutoCad drawings rather than a true geographic information
system (GIS), which MCEC upgraded in 00 . The utility’s technology
was stuck in the past, and MCEC had to move on.
Turning It All Around
To operate efficiently and provide excellent customer service, utilities
must ensure that customer service representatives, dispatchers and
technicians are in sync with one another at all times. This was certainly
one of the driving factors in MCEC’s decision to replace its legacy system
with Oracle Utilities Network Management System. The utility needed a
highly scalable and fresh solution to connect its disparate working parts.
MCEC realized many benefits from its original implementation of
Oracle Utilities Network Management System, including using its newly
implemented ArcFM GIS system as the source of the network data model.
After about five years of using the application, the utility decided to take
the next step in more effectively and efficiently responding to the needs
of its customers by improving outage restoration.
In 008, MCEC decided to upgrade to the latest version of Oracle
Utilities Network Management System. MCEC hoped the upgrade would
allow it to streamline its automatic advanced metering infrastructure
(AMI) integration, better identify and resolve power outages and, most
importantly help identify “priority groups” – small groups of members in
need of life support – in the event of an outage. Further, MCEC wanted
to reduce call times in its service centers to improve productivity and
enhance customer satisfaction.
Flipping the Switch
The implementation phase lasted approximately five months and the
team went through numerous migrations and testing phases. Through
this, the utility learned that it could meet its goals of improving
restoration and meeting the needs of its customers by upgrading to the
latest version of its Oracle Utilities Network Management System.
March-April 2009 Issue I
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