System and method for surveying utility outages
First Claim
1. A system for identifying a utility service failure in a distribution network between a utility provider and a plurality of customer premises, said system comprising:
- a detection system, at each of said customer premises, including means for determining utility service status at said customer premises, a monitoring system at the utility provider and including a geographical database correlating a geographical location of each of said customer premises with a geographical location of equipment within the distribution network, means, within the detection systems, for reporting the determined service status over a communications network to the monitoring system, and means, within said monitoring system and responsive to said reported service status and in combination with said geographical database, for identifying the utility service failure in said distribution network.
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Accused Products
Abstract
Utility failures are automatically detected and potential causes for these failures are automatically located and identified without having to physically search a utility provider'"'"'s network. Detection systems capable of monitoring utility status are located at each, or a subset, of the customer premises serviced by a utility provider. A monitoring system, capable of correlating the geographical location of the detection systems with the geographical location of the equipment that comprises the utility provider'"'"'s network, is located at a utility provider and interconnects with the detection systems through a communications network. The monitoring system queries the detection systems to determine utility status and to subsequently locate an outage and deduce a possible cause for the outage. Detection systems can also be configured to automatically contact the monitoring system to report utility status. The monitoring system is also capable of sending customer based information messages to the detection systems.
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Citations
17 Claims
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1. A system for identifying a utility service failure in a distribution network between a utility provider and a plurality of customer premises, said system comprising:
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a detection system, at each of said customer premises, including means for determining utility service status at said customer premises, a monitoring system at the utility provider and including a geographical database correlating a geographical location of each of said customer premises with a geographical location of equipment within the distribution network, means, within the detection systems, for reporting the determined service status over a communications network to the monitoring system, and means, within said monitoring system and responsive to said reported service status and in combination with said geographical database, for identifying the utility service failure in said distribution network. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12)
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13. A method for locating a utility service failure in a distribution network between a utility provider and a plurality of customer premises, said method comprising:
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determining utility service status at each of said customer premises, reporting the determined utility service status over a communications network to said utility provider, correlating a geographical location of each of said reporting customer premises with a geographical location of equipment within the distribution network, and identifying the location of the utility service failure based on said correlating step. - View Dependent Claims (14, 15, 16, 17)
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Specification