Registration of HAN Devices

Transcription

1 Registration of HAN Devices Connectivity Week Conference May 25, 2011 By Larry Kohrmann ConnectivityWeek 2011

2 Texas Market Background Oncor is a Transmission and Distribution Service Provider in Texas Two types of customers Retail Electric Providers (100+ in service territory) - Sell retail electricity - Responsible for customer billing End use customers (3.2 million in service territory) 1.7 million Smart Meters installed (installing 24,000/week) Reliable grid operations through the application of technology ConnectivityWeek 20111

3 ZigBee Smart Energy Device Registration Process Registration is required to enable HAN functions (Near) Real time usage data Pricing Demand Response/Load control Etc. ZSE 1.x device registration with Utility ESI is out of band Device MAC address and install code is provided to utility & pushed down to the meter Utility ESI is opened only to that MAC address and install code to accept registration of the HAN device (meter provisioning) HAN device exchanges security credentials with ESI to create a secure link to the ESI for information exchange ConnectivityWeek 20112

4 HAN Device Registration HAN device registration provides the customer s initial experience with the Home Area Systems with greatest impact on device registration are nowhere near the home. They are in the utility back office and IT systems Similar to the results from flipping on a light switch, the average person sees this: When what is really happening is this: ConnectivityWeek 20113

5 Path of Registration Information to the Meter (Source: NIST Interoperability Framework 1.0) ConnectivityWeek 20114

6 Path of Registration Information to the Meter - Oncor RF Mesh Meter HAN HAN Smart Appliances AMI HEAD END MDMS DATA REPOSITORY RF Mesh Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) Repeater/Router Collector Backhaul Smart Meter Texas Portal Customer Account Data REPs Oncor Internal Web Portal Consumer ConnectivityWeek 20115

7 Acknowledgements Matching databases for HAN Information 15 Minute Acknowledgement timeouts RF Mesh Meter HAN HAN Smart Appliances AMI HEAD END MDMS DATA REPOSITORY RF Mesh Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) Repeater/Router Collector Backhaul Smart Meter Texas Portal Customer Account Data REPs Oncor Internal Web Portal Consumer ConnectivityWeek 20116

8 HAN Device Rollouts Oncor did a 500 device HAN rollout in late 2010 as a beta test of the network and get feedback on the HAN Had a 90%+ success rate on first pass meter provisioning Used some work-arounds to deal with some known system issues Installed patches and new firmware to correct known issues Oncor made commitments to the Texas market that it was ready for scaled rollouts of HAN devices Reliant Energy came to Oncor last month with plans for a 300 unit rollout in Oncor s territory HAN device firmware had been validated by Oncor test lab as interoperable with meter firmware Completed discussion on issue resolution support models Reliant given green light to start deployment (meters to be provisioned by Reliant through SMT portal) ConnectivityWeek 20117

9 HAN Device Rollouts (cont.) Initial results were below expectations 50% first pass success rate 90% success rate on second pass Seeing communication errors from meters Seeing MDMS acknowledgement timeouts If databases get out of sync, they require a manual cleanout to repair time consuming process Oncor formed a tiger team to analyze the problems and develop solutions Identified two primary problems Meter firmware issue Data center routing issue ConnectivityWeek 20118

10 HAN Device Rollouts (cont.) MAC addresses and Install codes were failing to reach the ESI Lack of meter acknowledgements resulted in database timeouts Matching databases for HAN Information 15 Minute Acknowledgement timeouts RF Mesh Meter HAN HAN Smart Appliances AMI HEAD END MDMS DATA REPOSITORY RF Mesh Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) Repeater/Router Collector Backhaul Smart Meter Texas Portal Customer Account Data REPs Data center routing issue resulted in packets not reaching their destination Oncor Internal Web Portal Consumer ConnectivityWeek 20119

11 Problem Resolution Had new meter communications firmware ready to release to fix problem Data center routing issue is still under review to determine root cause and resolution Oncor has taken over meter provisioning for HAN rollout from Reliant until we have resolved all network issues. Allows Oncor easier troubleshooting of related problems Allows Reliant to maintain their HAN device delivery schedules to their customers Maximizes end use customer s experience by receiving timely delivery on their HAN device and it being ready to register out of the box Received first 79 requests last Friday afternoon. By 10 AM Monday, 73 meters were provisioned. Last 6 were completed by Wednesday. ConnectivityWeek

12 Progress It will take 3-4 weeks for meter firmware to propagate out to the entire network (1.7 million 90%+) An automated process is being set up to allow a forced synchronization of the AMI databases if a failure gets them out of synch. Performance analysis continues to try to determine the cause of data center routing problems. Oncor will continue to handle meter provisioning for REPs until we can reliability achieve 90+% first pass success on the meter provisioning process through the portal APIs ConnectivityWeek 2011

13 Lessons Learned (so far) Process short cuts and work-arounds can sometimes mask other issues There is a complex path from web portal to the meter and back, don t underestimate the number of failure modes available Thoroughly volume test back office applications Its all about the customer do what is required to meet their expectations whether the customer is a Retail Energy Provider or an end use customer Oncor made a commitment to the Texas PUC and the Texas retail market to enable customer Home Area s. We will continue to refine our systems to allow the market to reach production quantity registration of HAN devices via the Smart Meter Texas Web Portal. ConnectivityWeek

14 Questions? ConnectivityWeek