NEW YORK-Electric power companies have seen the future and it is wireless.
The Electric Power Research Institute, a 700-plus member organization based in Palo Alto, Calif., recently established a Wireless Solutions Office. EPRI, whose annual budget exceeds $500 million, manages science and technology research and development for the electric utility industry.
In a newly competitive environment, power companies are looking at wireless as a possible means to provide value-added services for two key reasons, said Karyn Plank, a spokesman for EPRI. The first is “field force automation,” improving the efficiency of mobile utility workers by providing them with remote access to company databases for customer information, system maps, etc.
Deregulation not only has placed power companies in competition with each other but also has allowed them to offer different types of services not typically associated with electric utilities. “With deregulation, utilities are looking at other things that will generate revenues and guarantee customer loyalty-providing `smart homes’ that allow remote monitoring and control of [power] use, or how they can participate in the PCS (personal communications services) market, or become Internet providers,” Plank said.
Current WSO research will focus on four key issues, EPRI said: using wireless for value-added services inside and beyond historical service territory; build vs. lease options; assessing technical developments, standards, vendors and products to reduce the risk of technical obsolescence; applicability and potential of low-earth-orbiting satellites.
The build vs. lease option component of the research “is an issue (that) has surfaced recently due to efforts by certain equipment vendors [to offer] turnkey services, especially for meter reading,” said the EPRI “Statement of Work” for the new Wireless Solutions Office. “A variety of strategic and tactical concerns about the costs and benefits of outsourcing wireless communications infrastructure and services will be addressed.”
Because of the rapidly changing nature of wireless services, the new EPRI office will conduct ongoing evaluations into technologies and technology providers.
“For example, narrowband applications at 900 MHz and 2 GHz already are emerging, and new allocations at 5 GHz are likely to result in short-range wideband applications,” the WSO statement said. “Additional technologies of particular interest include paging, which is already low-cost and ubiquitous [and] is in transition from one-way personal alerting to two-way voice and data services. PCS is likely to spread rapidly to challenge conventional telephone and cellular services.”
The Wireless Solutions Office will examine these wireless technologies for possible use in customer communications and home automation, among others.
The last part of the WSO’s scope of work involves evaluating the potential for LEO satellites not only in utility applications, especially in rural areas, but also as a possible capital investment for utility companies.
“These new domestic satellite systems … could conceivably radically alter the communications economics for low-bandwidth telemetry in support of enhanced utility power system instrumentation … For example, Global Positioning Timing signals can be used to synchronize recording of events and for other distribution automation requirements,” the scope of work description said.
“Satellites could be used to broadcast pricing and load control information. Satellite voice, data and image communications are also likely to be relied upon more in the future for personal communications and coordination in emergencies.”
