After winning a regional ReliabilityOne award for 2007, Kansas City Power & Light (KCP&L; Kansas City, Missouri, U.S.) went on to win PA Consulting Group's National Reliability Excellence Award. The National Reliability Excellence Award is the top honor given to a single ReliabilityOne regional award recipient that has demonstrated sustained leadership, innovation and achievement in the area of electric reliability.

“Being named the most reliable electric utility in the nation is quite an accomplishment,” says Bill Herdegen, vice president of customer operations for KCP&L. “We are focused on delivering outstanding service and reliable power to our customers.”

The selection criteria for the National Reliability Excellence Award are both quantitative and qualitative including:

• Superior regional performance

• Sustained performance over time

• Improved performance over time

• Leadership in outage data collection and reporting systems, processes, procedures and controls

• Organizational and cultural focus on reliability

• Communication, planning, preparation and response to major events

• Contributions to regional system security and reliability.

“PA Consulting Group's reliability evaluations include independent review of data by third parties,” Herdegen notes. “In addition to reviewing traditional outage metrics, PA Consulting Group also considers the impact of customer metrics, outage management system metrics and automated meter-reading system impacts.”

In fact, says Herdegen, companies, including KCP&L, who have automated meter-reading systems have real-time, accurate outage data available they can use to make much more efficient and timely decisions. “At KCP&L, we are expanding that by automating our downtown network, implementing distribution automation for our rural networks and evaluating technologies that will comprise the circuit of the future.”

Winning the prestigious award has been good for the morale of KCP&L crews. “They receive positive feedback for their hardwork,” explains Herdegen.

All utilities operating electric delivery networks in North America are eligible for consideration for the ReliabilityOne award.