January 15th - Less than three minutes after it took off from New York's LaGuardia airport, US Airways flight 1549 landed in the Hudson River after losing power in both engines. By now, most have heard about the extraordinary water landing that experts are saying saved the lives of the 155 passengers on board. While reading the news story about the flight, I was amazed by the quick thinking and heroic efforts of pilot Chesley B. "Sully" Sullenberger and his crew who ensured the safety of their passengers. The training, preparedness and expertise of the crew turned what could have been a tragic event into a story of success and inspiration. Even though the plane was functioning as designed, something unexpected occurred during its routine operation which highlighted the importance of the team.

This same scenario occurs daily in systems throughout the world—though admittedly nowhere near as dramatic. Due to tight timelines and budgets, most system projects focus on performing the building and testing of the systems with little attention to how product will be supported and maintained in the day-to-day operations. Many times the support and operations personnel had little to no involvement with the design and construction, but are responsible to ensure the accuracy and performance of the system. In addition to how well the product is designed, how well the team is prepared to operate the system can make a substantial difference in costs and opinions of your customers.

With Smart Grid technologies driving the need to enhance and replace existing systems and infrastructure, now is the time to make sure an end-to-end view of the systems' requirements are analyzed to insure the "smart" benefits can be truly realized after the systems are implemented. Good program management is needed to insure the final deployment provides the necessary functionality not only to meet the intended business requirements but also to handle the unexpected. The days of communicating with the customer once a month through a paper bill are slowly coming to an end. Interactive Voice Response (IVR) and the Internet have already begun new channels of communication with customers and the Smart Grid will only increase the tools and the information available for them. The volumes of data and the multiple methods of communication will produce even more pressure on the systems and support teams. The awareness and the education of the customer base will increase the need for more accurate and timely information and will place a brighter spotlight on any problem areas.

Design is Critical

An effective system design considers the impact of errors and troubleshooting on daily operations. A design with a strong operational understanding can aid in the diagnosis of an issue by providing valuable error handling, alarms, alerts and and diagnostic data. If the system does experience an unexpected error, can it be resolved quickly with minimum impact? Can the system detect where in the process it was when it failed, or does it require manual intervention to be restarted? Standardizing the processes across the various components and systems can not only improve operational efficiencies but can also facilitate cross training and reduce overall training cost.

A good architectural design will also include redundancy to reduce the down time of a system. But once again the need for a solid understanding of the process is needed to analyze and identify single points of failure. All of the redundant hardware in the world will not serve any purpose if it's tied to a single failed circuit.

The increasing complexity and time criticality of the new systems places even more importance on two key project deliverables: documentation and automated controls.

* Documentation always seems to be the last thing on a developer's to-do list, but it is one of the most critical deliverables to aid in knowledge transfer and a successful support operation. A project team will many times take the requirements document and just repackage it to mark the task complete on the project plan. The fact that a document exists isn't nearly as important as how it will be used. Too much documentation can be a burden to use and provides little value. Clean, concise, and standardized documentation in a single repository with a searchable function can be a support resource's best tool. Work with the operational team to understand what information is needed. It is also important to require a documentation review and update as part of the group's change control procedure to insure the documentation stays current and relevant.
* Automation Controls can allow the support teams to build meaningful alarms that will identify when acceptable thresholds are exceeded or when unexpected events occur. General Controls insure compliance with systems methodology, corporate security, change control and protocol standards across organizational boundaries. Embedded Controls can be used to insure data integrity, accuracy and validity. By clearly defining the critical events and building automatic quality checks within the process, the support team will be better positioned to identify when failures occur and to address them immediately.

By placing all of the performance metrics in a single dashboard or information portal, the operational team will be able closely monitor and control the performance and health of the system. Performance and response times can be tied to key performance indicators, making operational efficiencies an important component of smart grid measurements of success.

Knowledge Transfer

The transfer of knowledge from the project team to the support and operations resources is the final critical step in a successful implementation. Knowledge transfer is more than just a communication of the information and incorporates a variety of components. Knowledge can include an understanding of the high level end-to-end business processes, detail training on daily and emergency procedures. Education on how to use, modify and update system documentation should be included in training and knowledge transfer. It is important that the project team recognizes the roles of the operational team and to prepare them to be positioned to assume the ownership of the system. The transition period requires proper planning and execution to insure the information can be recalled and put into practical use.

Preparation should include a process to implement a post critique of any emergency situations to identify the lessons learned, what went wrong and what went right. By performing an impact analysis of an event and creating action items to prevent re-occurrence, you will be able to derive a benefit from an unexpected issue.

Conclusion

System vulnerabilities are exposed after a project is complete and the system is in daily use. New changes to the system, design and construction errors, or unexpected events can result in challenging situations. How well you have prepared your team will make the difference in how the result is viewed. Training, preparedness and expertise of your smart grid crew could change potentially serious system events into success and inspiration to others. Planning for the unexpected should be a part of the overall approach to smart grid system delivery, as with most infrastructure projects. The recovery time in a system crash will be the measure of the successful plan. And if everyone can walk away, even if it requires aid and assistance from everyone involved, it can be considered an overwhelming success.

UtiliPoint's IssueAlert^® articles are compiled based on the independent analysis of UtiliPoint consultants. The opinions expressed in UtiliPoint's^® IssueAlert^® articles are not intended to predict financial performance of companies discussed, or to be the basis for investment decisions of any kind. UtiliPoint's sole purpose in publishing its IssueAlert articles is to offer an independent perspective regarding the key events occurring in the energy industry, based on its long-standing reputation as an expert on energy issues. © 2008, UtiliPoint^® International, Inc. All rights reserved.  To subscribe or visit go to:  www.utilipoint.com