Owen Electric Cooperative Talks with NRTC about Cannon AMI
December 2, 2009--Owen Electric Cooperative’s President and CEO Mark Stallons and Tim Cammack, manager of Technical Services, recently talked with NRTC about the Owen Electric’s Cannon advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) installation. Owen Electric, an NRTC member based in Owenton, KY, provides electricity to 58,000 members throughout its nine-county territory. Owen Electric purchased its Cannon AMI system through its membership in NRTC.
Why did you select Cannon AMI from NRTC?
Cammack: The overall team took about 14 to 16 months to come to a decision on which AMI system to use. The first phase of the process was to decide if we should install an AMI system at all—then we needed to get the “go, no go” approval from our board of directors.
The second phase of the process was to select a specific vendor. It really was an extensive decision-making process. We used a special decision-making model provided to us by an outside consultant. After determining what the ideal system would be, and what we would like to achieve, we ranked potential vendors based on 54 different criteria divided into eight categories. Some of those categories included: potential for future offerings, the financial stability of the vendor, the quality of support offered, software, the user interface and others.
On the AMI decision-making team of 12, Cannon was ranked the number one choice by 11 of the 12 participants.
After selecting Cannon, Owen Electric Cooperative deployed its AMI system using an untraditional deployment method. Can you tell us why you elected to deploy your system this way?
Cammack: We decided to deploy all of our meters first—within a very short period—and then install the substation equipment as the meters were deployed. This is unusual, as you normally install substation equipment first, and then install the meters afterward.
We did it this way so that we could perform some troubleshooting on our system. With all of the meters installed, it was easier for us to track down problems. We weren’t surprised when, at first, we only had about an 85-percent read rate on all of the meters, but this was by design, and we really looked at this as a benefit to our system. We were able to troubleshoot substation by substation to make our system even better.
What are your meter read rates like today?
Cammack: Our overall read rate is generally around 98.2 percent. In all, we have 25 different substations, and ten of those have average read rates above 99 percent. Of those ten, seven are above 99.5 percent. Our goal is to hit 99.5 percent on all of our substations, and we’re getting close to that.
No deployment project as large as yours is free from installation troubles. What was your experience? How did NRTC and Cannon respond to your problems?
Stallons: We did have a few issues, but if Cannon knew about it, they were either on the phone with us or already in the process of fixing it. Actually, they usually found the issues first, not us. Everyone was very responsive to our questions and concerns.
Do you attend the Cannon User Group meetings?
Stallons: We just got back from one, actually. Cannon really looks for input from their users. They asked us questions and really tried to get us involved in the future of the hardware. Cannon also taught us how to use the system in ways we hadn’t thought of.
Can you talk about the Yukon software platform that’s part of the Cannon AMI system?
Stallons: Yukon is agnostic to what and how it interfaces. It’s MultiSpeak Version 3 compliant, and that’s very important as I look forward to things like load management switches, enabling the smart home and distribution automation. Yukon is flexible and modular, and it can interface with an unlimited number of products from other vendors.
As far as the user interface goes, it’s been great for everyone who uses it. You don’t need to be a computer programmer to use it.
This software was a big plus for us when we were making our initial AMI decision. Cannon makes sure that it upgrades Yukon, and the system is always improving. The great thing about it is, you can really dig into the data and get a lot of different types of reports. The whole system is really designed to be customized to every utility individually.
Can you talk about some of the key benefits that Cannon has over some of the other systems you evaluated?
Cammack: In 2006, we did a pilot project, and right away we interfaced Cannon AMI with our Milsoft Dispatch outage management system (OMS). It was the easiest systems interfacing we ever performed.
Today, after our AMI deployment, we’re able to use that interface to ping specific meters to help isolate outages. Recently, we had an outage and, using our AMI-OMS interface, we were able to isolate the issue down to a single pole. Our field staff didn’t need to drive up and down the street looking for issues, and dispatch directed them right where they needed to be.
Stallons: In the midst of an outage, you don’t want to be in a situation where you have to wait to make decisions. Because Cannon AMI has such a fast ping speed—around five seconds—we don’t have to wait around for meter data to come in. Even systems with a fairly quick ping rates of 30 seconds wouldn’t be useful to help you find outages—it’s just too much time.
Cannon enables us to make real-time decisions and get our crews to the right part of the system. They then repair the problem quickly and restore service to our members. We use Cannon now on every outage, and we use it to confirm that the service has been restored.
For more information about Cannon AMI, visit NRTC's AMI Web site or contact your NRTC Regional Business Manager.