It's Electrifying! - October 29, 2007

IT'S ELECTRIFYING!

We have a lot to celebrate at Orcas Power and Light Cooperative these days! To begin with, October is National Cooperative Month. With so much going on in our busy lives, it is easy to think of OPALCO as “the electric - and perhaps fiber - company”. In fact, OPALCO is a non-profit cooperative, with local ownership and accountability. Being a member of OPALCO has lots of exciting bonuses, including:

reliable power at the lowest possible cost

exciting and effective energy conservation programs

renewable energy opportunities

capital credit allocations

Another cause for celebration at OPALCO is the kick-off of our new automated meter reading system. As many OPALCO members saw firsthand during last year’s storms, restoring power in our multi-island community can be both dangerous and time consuming, especially when combined with darkness, wind, ice, snow, rain, fog and dangerous roads/waterways.

Improving this situation actually begins at the meter. In 2006, OPALCO directors approved installation of an automated meter reading (AMR) system, which will eventually replace every meter in our system. OPALCO staff has been working steadily to prepare for this conversion, and rollout of the AMR system will be ongoing over the next four years. The cost of the AMR system is offset by the following benefits:

communication to and from each member’s meter on a daily, and even hourly, basis

reports on outages and interruptions

improved outage response and restoration times

possibility of remote disconnection and reconnection of meters

ability to read a meter real time to respond to member billing inquiries or generate a final bill

reduction of meter access issues or seasonal read requirements

reduced meter maintenance and meter shop time

reduced meter reading and meter testing expenses

reduced line loss

improved load data acquisition for industry reporting

increased system engineering analysis

OPALCO is also in the process of updating our SCADA (Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition) system, which will allow us to remotely open and close breakers from our offices. This is very significant because it will save our crews from going back and forth from the outage site to the substation – a dangerous and timely procedure.

Everyone at OPALCO is excited about the new AMR system, and we look forward to serving our members better with this new technology. Its many benefits will increase safety, reliability, communication, and efficiency while decreasing overall costs and system vulnerability. This is just another example of the cooperative effort – being owned by and operated for the benefit of all our members!

OPALCO
Member Owned & Operated