Business Benefits

This heavy reliance on the GIS system and the data it maintains has provided NIE with an additional return on its investment in GIS technology. On the other hand, the OMS/DMS has enhanced the GIS by giving valuable feedback as it identifies and reports immediately any errors in the GIS data. Using the GIS data for the electrical connectivity model, NIE now has the availability of detailed outage history that goes down to the level of the individual customer.

While the SPL OMS/DMS project was still in the final phase of implementation, NIE was already reaping rewards from its investment. Compared to the 1998 storm, statistics from a snow storm in February 2001 illustrated a significant improvement in operations. In the latter instance, 1200 faults on the distribution system resulted in 100,000 customers losing power. This time, however, 94% were restored within 24 hours — a 10% improvement over two years earlier, and trouble management had reduced the overall outage duration by 36 hours.

The Future

Current performance is even better. In January 2005, unexpected 90-mph (140-kmph) wind gusts produced 1300 faults, but only 60,000 customers lost supply, proving the greater resiliency of the 33-kV and 11-kV networks. Restoration times also showed a remarkable improvement as 95% of all customers were back on-line within 24 hours, and only 0.2% were without electricity after 48 hours.

In September 2006, a violent storm resulted in some 104,000 customers experiencing supply disruptions. Again, restoration times were very good with 98% of customers restored within 24 hours, and all but four customers were restored within 48 hours.

Since the full implementation of the trouble-management and switching-management functionalities in April 2000 and August 2002, respectively, considerable financial savings as well as significant improvements in customer service have been achieved. The initial expenditure of around £9 million (US$17.7 million) has resulted in equivalent cost savings over a five-year period.

Customer service has significantly improved during fault outages with consistent real-time information now provided to all customers either by a call handler or from the fault messaging system. Customers have also experienced a reduction in the average time they are off-line due to faults. The standard measure of CML has been reduced by 30% over a five-year period. All of these favorable statistics show that the introduction of these systems, along with robust incident-management procedures, has greatly enhanced NIE's ability to deal with severe weather events.

Even more improvements have been made recently. A new interface linking the trouble-management functionality to the automated messaging system has significantly improved the processing of fault calls, thereby enabling more accurate fault analysis. This has been highly effective during widespread power outages when the dramatic increase in call volumes causes a higher proportion of calls to be diverted to the automated messaging system. Previously, callers would only have been able to hear an updated fault message report, but now they can also log their call directly into the trouble-management system.

The upgrade to the trouble-management functionality and the OMS has also provided other enhancements: a more ergonomic screen layout; customized prediction rules that can be tailored to different storm types, for example lightning; and the electronic tagging of safety documentation, which further improves the safe operation of the distribution network.

NIE considers the new system to be a resounding success. The combination of a new business focus, streamlined processes, appropriately skilled and motivated employees, and leading-edge technology from SPL, now Oracle, has delivered significant financial and customer-satisfaction benefits.

Michael Skelton joined Northern Ireland Electricity (NIE) as a trainee engineer in 1974. His career started as a distribution technical engineer, and since 1993, he has held management positions critical to the delivery of customer service. In 1998, Skelton was responsible for implementing a centralized emergency-response operation for NIE that involved a new distribution control center and central dispatch office, to ensure the utility had effective plans to deal with major network emergencies. NIE has been externally recognized for its leading role in the area of emergency response. Skelton, who retired from NIE in March 2007, has a diploma in electrical engineering, a bachelor's degree in business studies and a master's degree in corporate leadership.
michaelskelton@f2s.com