RAO UES (the United Energy System of Russia) is replacing its central and regional energy management systems with modern state-of-the-art systems. In September, top managers from RAO UES and from Russia's major infrastructure energy organizations signed a Memorandum of Understanding acknowledging the importance of using the EPRI-facilitated industry Common Information Model (CIM) as the principal mechanism for enabling compatibility of information within the Russian electric power system.

Dejan Sobajic, product line director at EPRI (Palo Alto, California, U.S.), says that developments in the energy markets will require new automated systems at all levels of the Russian energy sector. “The Russian infrastructure organizations will establish a CIM Coordination Council charged with maintaining the consistency and integrity of CIM for the Russian operators,” he says. EPRI and KEMA Consulting of Switzerland will participate in the work and provide advisory support to the newly formed council.

In the United States, adherence to CIM is required by the North American Reliability Council (NERC) and is used by 30 utilities and independent system operators. In addition to increasing reliability, the establishment of CIM has broken down proprietary software barriers and allowed users to obtain software from a variety of sources at lower cost.
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