Why real-time access to critical downstream operational data and utility commercial IT systems is key to making informed business decisions.
Overview
There is mounting pressure and expectation for utilities to make decisions more effectively and quickly. Just like ISOs, DSOs now need real-time transactional data to know what’s happening on their grids. Over the next five years many distribution network operators (DNOs) are transforming into distribution system operators (DSOs)
“Electricity is real-time; therefore the utility business is real-time. The more latency you put into data processing; you’re losing the effect of responding to the data (i.e. events) in real-time”
Challenges
Organizations right now are trying to employ a centralized data management system. Processing however is often slowed down by colocation strategies such as distributed file systems, data lakes and centralized data warehouses, where data needs to be duplicated.
Transforming data into a business asset requires near real-time processing. Creating a data structure and presenting it to a business for their consumption is easier than a data scientist searching through data to understand what a business wants
PowerRunner therefore places an emphasis on putting data into the hands of the business user whether they be in engineering, accounting, IT or the executive suite, all of whom need an accurate , real time view of their grid.
Solution
The PowerRunner Energy Platform is a data virtualization layer designed to integrate real-time operational data and commercial data with full data governance and security and highly configurable presentation layer.
Our data virtualization layer pulls disparate data into our transaction platform. Instead of replicating data from system to system, data is organized and available locally in a user-friendly way for business units to utilize
Because PowerRunner is capable of date timestamping, versioning and maintaining all these data sets the business effectively has a historical view of all operational and financial information at any point in time. Our solution is proven within many industries and established companies and has saved large sums of money through improved use of assets, while improving service and reliability.
PowerRunner has the ability to take the network topology and ensure all of the systems it’s supporting are in alignment. This makes for the business to carry out activities such as reporting, calculating, aggregations or market settlements. Maintaining accuracy not only on the topology, but also from a financial perspective is critical to settlements.
The ability to gather OT data and time series sets, and join it with the ongoing commercial data (market pricing, rate structures, etc.) provides a holistic view of the emerging DSO model.
Benefits
PowerRunner created a unique forecast model for each of the 2.6 million meters using our machine learning algorithms. As weather changes and the load changes in response to weather, for example, that tweaks our models and continually tunes them to improve over time. The temporal and spatial granularity of our forecasts provide the DSO with near-real-time situational awareness.
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