Dave,
Just playing devil's advocate here.
There are many different SCADA-type systems that could be developed and
used by utilities but all have one common thing that's missing today:
Network Infrastructure covering all customers. Sure, some small
percentage
of customers today now have cable modems, DSL, and the like, but not ALL
of
them. Not even most of them. Most of them have no reliable or easily
accessed data link into the home.
Here are just three of many possible schemes:
1. DA or Distribution Automation does not require connections to any
homes
but it does to various control equipment (switches, cap banks, etc.).
This
completely lacks any infrastructure today EVEN IF EVERY HOME HAD CABLE
MODEMS OR DSL. Some utilities have used wireless to do this in remote
areas like northern MN. But the coverage area is limited by wireless
issues and infrastructure costs of wide area radio systems capable of
handling wireless data.
2. Outage Detection is only useful if a large percentage or nearly every
home has a link to provide meaningful info to the utility. If only
10%-30%
have it, they won't be able to tell from the data if the outage is a lot
of
down feeds to homes or a major outage caused by one single device or feed.
So they will still need to revert to the old way of handling this outage.
But if they know it's every home that's out on a given circuit, they can
now address that outage much faster and more efficiently than before. A
BPL Network with new meters everywhere (yes, expensive to do all at once!)
could provide meaningful outage detection data. This will take time to
migrate towards.
3. Energy Mgmt could be done on a limited basis whenever a customer wants
it installed to get a lower electric rate. This is mostly controlling
overall load through cycling customers' A/C & water heaters OFF/ON
depending on system load. It could be made available today to the few who
have a reliable network connection (DSL or cable), but the typical person
who'd be interested in the savings (lower income households) probably do
not have DSL or cable network connections so BPL would reach these folks.
Watch out what the network providers might start doing once this becomes
widespread. This is just speculation, but there might be additional ISP
costs to allow such commerical access to your home if there are different
rates for commercial than normal residential access.
With BPL, utilities will have "their own network" which they have control
over. No sudden additional charges by outside suppliers. That's a lot
more attractive in many ways. If they could've really done this years
ago,
they would have.
For some utilities like public utilities, this may be the only reason they
seriously take a look at BPL since they may not be able to get into the
internet aspect due to regulatory restrictions. Leasing bandwidth to an
ISP might be an option and would be icing on the BPL cake. To hams it
doesn't justify polluting 40-50Mhz or more of spectrum; but to
non-hams--the other 99.7% of the population, that's another story. It's
going to get worse before it gets better, if it does.
73, de ed -K0iL
Omaha, NE
-----Original Message-----
From: Dave Bernstein
I've seen no description of how real-time utility control might work, and
so
can't comment on that aspect.
I don't at all discount time-of-day meter meter reading; my previous
message
described it as a "win-win" for everyone. Were power companies focused on
this, they could introduced it years ago using techniques like those
employed by pay-per-view suppliers.
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