Powering Beyond: AMR Benefits & Revenue Opportunities

1. AMR is Much More Than AMROutage Management, Reliability, Call Centers, and Asset Utilization All Win Big Ed Malemezian President, Ed Malemezian Consulting, Inc. Metering America 2005 – Beyond AMR !!!

2. Show me the money !! Presentation Outline • AMR Benefit Categories • Operational Savings • Supply Side & Resource Savings • New Revenue Opportunities • The New Frontier • Outage Management • Care Center Support • Asset Optimization

3. Quantifiable Benefits - Hard $$$ • Reduced expenses • Avoided losses • More effective planning • Reduction in capital expenditures • New revenue opportunities

4. Intangible Benefits - Soft $$$ • Customer service benefits • Improved relations with regulators • Enhancement of your “brand” • Strategic benefits • We really won’t go into these today

5. Operational Savings • Outage investigation - NTH • Outage follow-up - NTH • Reliability indices - NTH • Care center support - NT • Current diversion • Connect/Disconnect - NTH • Collections – NTH • Revenue assurance - NTH • Usage / inactive acct - NTH • Meter Reading • Estimated Bills • Meter accuracy - NT • Meter maintenance - NT • EMR equipment - NT • LP communications – NT • Load research - NT • Outage care center - NT • Outage dispatch - NT NT denotes Non-Traditional and NTH denotes NT Huge

6. Supply Side & Resource Savings • Distribution Planning - NTH • Transmission Planning - NTH • Generation Expansion - NTH • Load Forecasting - NTH • Demand-Response – NTH • Asset Optimization - NTH

7. New Revenue Opportunities • Power Quality Monitoring - NT • Power Outage Notification - NT • kW Demand Monitoring - NT • kW Threshold Alerts - NT • Load Profile Data Services

8. The New Frontier • Outage Management & Reliability • Care Center Support • Asset Optimization

9. Outage Management (OM) • Consists of four interrelated sub-systems • Outage Detection • Outage Extent Mapping • Outage Restoration Monitoring • Momentary Interruption Monitoring

10. Outage Management - cont • Integrated with utility CIS, OMS, GIS & WMS systems • Must be highly automated • Little operator intervention • Runs in real time • Effective filtering

11. Outage Detection • Runs constantly in the background • Detect outages in near-real time • Detection goals • Feeder & Line Section: less than 5 minutes with strategically placed meters • Transformer & individual customers: less than 10 minutes to cover 100% of meters • Must be reliable with few false positives

12. Outage Extent Mapping • Once triggered, determines the extent of each outage • Must know distribution network connectivity model and escalation rules • Triggered by • AMR Outage Detection sub-system • Utility OMS, VRU, call center, or other related systems • Smart enough to identify separate outages in the same geographic vicinity vs. rolling up into a single, larger outage

13. Outage Restoration Monitoring • Works very closely with Outage Extent Mapping • Runs in near-real time to monitor the progress of outage restoration activity • Verification that all customers have actually been restored • Before restoration crews leave the area • Before trouble ticket is closed out • Eliminates the “stragglers” • Proactive customer service

14. Restoration Monitoring - cont • Eliminates the need to make follow-up phone calls • Manual / care center • Predictive dialers & associated systems • Tremendous tool for follow-up on multi-day outages - hurricanes, ice storms, floods, etc. • Particularly beneficial when people are not home • Vacation, summer home, mountain cabin, etc. • Left to ride out the storm somewhere else • Feeds data to reliability indicators

15. Momentary Interruption Monitoring • Works closely with Outage Detection • Monitor Momentary Interruption counters in each meter (blink / power down counter) • Monitoring frequency can be • Near-real time - best • Historical - good • Feed tickets into utility Work Management or Outage Management Systems • Identify and reduce very annoying situations

16. Momentary Monitoring - cont • Momentary interruption counts can be aggregated to isolate the specific area where the problem is occurring • Troubleshooting can include more frequent monitoring (hourly) to isolate when the problem is occurring • Eliminate momentary problems (tree branches) before they become permanent outages

17. OM - Operational Savings • Care center call reduction - NT • AMR with real-time or near real-time communication provides the means to notify the utility of outages and PQ problems before the customer feels the need to call the utility • Calls to the care center will be reduced • Care center calls typically cost $1.00 to $10.00 per call to handle

18. OM - Operational Savings - cont • Trouble dispatch savings - NT • AMR with real-time or near real-time communication provides the means to verify the problem to be real before generating a trouble ticket and sending it to the trouble dispatcher • Calls handled by dispatch will be reduced • Tickets typically cost $0.50 to $10.00 per call to handle

19. OM - Operational Savings - cont • Investigation savings - NTH • AMR with real-time or near real-time communication provides the means to verify the problem to be real before sending a trouble ticket to the field for investigation • Outages can be more precisely defined • Investigators can be sent directly to the proper location to effect the most speedy (less costly) service restoration • Trouble tickets typically cost $25 to $150 per ticket to investigate

20. OM - Operational Savings - cont • Restoration follow-up savings - NTH • AMR with real-time or near real-time communication provides the means to verify that all customers are back in service before closing out the trouble ticket • All customers can be checked to have power and the expected voltage before the troubleman or field crew leaves the area • Done remotely vs. visiting each customer

21. OM - Operational Savings - cont • Restoration follow-up savings - cont • Typical savings of $5 to $10 per customer affected • Stragglers, or those inadvertently overlooked, will be eliminated • A very embarrassing situation will go away • Eliminates return visit at $25 to $150 per ticket • Eliminates the expense of follow-up phone calls

22. Power Quality • Closely related to Outage Management • Enabled by AMR system deployment • Tremendous impact on customer satisfaction • Facilitates improvement in Reliability Indicators reported to the utility commission

23. Power Quality - cont • Power outage detection • Voltage monitoring • High / low voltage • On demand checks - care center, customer service & account managers • Sags & swells • Voltage imbalance • Momentary interruptions • Harmonics

24. PQ - Operational Savings • Investigation savings • Voltage and Power Quality problems can be diagnosed remotely • Calls investigated in the field will be reduced • Trouble tickets typically cost $25 to $150 per ticket to investigate

25. PQ - New Revenue Opportunities • Upon receipt of PQ and outage calls, utility can offer “premium” services • Digital message - Customer notification via pager, cellphone, fax, and email, with the details of the problem • Automated generation of trouble tickets • CI customers willing to pay $25 to $100 per month per meter for these services • Customers love it !!!!

26. Reliability Improvement • Improvement in Reliability Indices - NTH • AMR with real-time or near real-time communication provides the means to reduce outage duration by speeding up the whole outage detection, investigation and restoration process • Reduced outage duration improves reliability indices such as SAIDI, CAIDI, ASAI, and others

27. Reliability Improvement - cont • Reliability Indices - continued • Improved reliability indices save maintenance and restoration $$$ - one can achieve reduced outage duration through brute force (more crews on duty, shotgun facility upgrades, etc.) or by faster outage detection, investigation & restoration • Improved reliability indices can bring in big $$$ with Performance Based Rates and related regulatory programs

28. Care Center Support • AMR systems and AMR data provide great assistance in solving customer problems • Historical usage data • Real-time information with the customer on the phone • Meter reads – billing issues • Final reads, move-in, and move-out • Power on or off – inside trouble or utility problem • Voltage – high, low, or flickering condition

29. Care Center - Historical Usage Data • Provide daily or hourly usage data • Easily posted on the web • Self-service for customer inquiries • Reduces call volume answering questions • Data readily available for care center rep • Helps explain customer usage • Compares present usage against past patterns • Visual tools help identify anomalies

30. Care Center - Real Time Data • Meter reads with customer on the phone • Identify or refute meter reading errors • Explain billing questions • Allows the rep to talk with authority – good data removes most uncertainty from the explanation • Final bills can be generated “on the spot” • Eliminates the need to send someone to field on customer move-in and move-out

31. Care Center - Real Time Data - cont • Power Problems • Can tell instantly if utility power is present at the meter or not • Identifies inside trouble or utility problem • Ask customer to check his breakers, etc. • Can eliminate a utility service call • Some AMR meters provide accurate voltage measurement at the meter • High, low, or flickering voltage • Inside trouble or utility problem • Can eliminate a utility service call

32. Care Center - Operational Savings • Care center call reduction • Calls to the care center will be reduced • Care center calls typically cost $1.00 to $10.00 per call to handle • Trips to the field will be reduced • Final / special meter reads typically cost $25 to $75 per read to obtain • Crew / trouble visits typically cost $25 to $150 per trip to investigate

33. Asset Optimization • AMR systems can provide hourly load profile data on some or all customers • With hourly load profile data on all the customers under a utility device you can determine the peak, coincident loading on that device • Distribution transformer • Line section (wire & fuse) • Recloser, Feeder, Substation, etc.

34. Asset Optimization - cont • Knowledge of peak loading in real time • Allows operation closer to maximum capabilities • The margin of safety can often be reduced - less uncertainty • Assists decision making for field switching during emergencies • AMR can provide accurate inputs to VAR management and related power optimization systems

35. Asset Optimization - cont • Knowledge of historical peak loading • Identifies underutilized utility devices (transformers, wire, fuses, etc.), thereby extending their useful life • Identifies overloaded utility devices – upgrade on regular time vs. burn-up • Provides valuable input to the utility planners making system improvements • Provides inputs into the utility design models used to engineer utility facilities

36. Asset Optimization - cont • Distribution Planning Savings • Better data provides for better, more effective planning, and better utilization of resources • Policies, practices, standards, and models can be fine-tuned to better reflect reality • Small improvement to the planning process results in huge savings • An improvement of 1.0% on an annual distribution budget of $200M is $2.0M

37. Asset Optimization - cont • Transmission Planning Savings • AMR systems allow the utility to collect detailed consumption and demand data on every customer up through the transmission system • Transmission planning processes and benefits are similar to those discussed for distribution • An improvement of 1.0% on an annual transmission budget of $150M is $1.5M

38. Asset Optimization - cont • Generation Expansion Savings • AMR systems allow the utility to collect detailed consumption and demand data on every customer up through the generating system • Generation expansion processes and benefits are similar to those discussed for distribution • An improvement of 1.0% on an annual generation budget of $250M is $2.5M

39. Conclusions • There are a myriad of benefits that bring value to AMR business cases – many are traditional – many are non-traditional • Outage Management, Care Center Support, and Asset Optimization are part of AMR’s New Frontier • The New Frontier is real: it is far beyond just talk and theory – FPL and a number of utilities are deriving these benefits today

40. Conclusions - continued • A key “lesson learned” is to get all the other utility groups involved at the outset – traditional utility silos are bad • Interface standards like MultiSpeak and IEC 61968 are helping with system integration issues – support them • Don’t overlook the New Frontier just because it is hard to get people on board - it adds tremendous value (more than meter reading) ... Go for it !!!

41. Questions ???? 772-286-9831 Ed@emalemezian.com