Automated utility supply management system integrating data sources including geographic information systems (GIS) data

• US 7,739,138 B2
• Filed: 05/19/2003
• Issued: 06/15/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 05/19/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: UAI Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Trimble Navigation Limited (Trimble Inc.)
• Inventors: Sanders, David, Dinkins, Jason, Wilson, Frank, Chauhan, Swatantar K., O'Neill, Adrian I., Guman, Michael A., Palmer, Christopher M.
• Primary Examiner(s): Van Doren; Beth
• Assistant Examiner(s): Fleischer; Mark A
• Application Number:
  US10/440,089
• Publication Number:
  US 20040236620A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,584 Days
• Field of Search: 705/1, 705/7, 705/8, 705/9, 700/286, 700291- 5, 700/297, 455/405
• US Class Current: 705/7.14
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/063112 Skill-based matching of a person or a group to a task
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06315 Needs-based resource requirements planning or analysis

Abstract

An automated management system for managing data, outage repair, load switching, job workflow and crew dispatching, crew workflow, installation, maintenance and restoration of utility services by integrating geographic information systems (GIS) data with many other data sources so as to gather, transform, manipulate, analyze, and produce desired information for continuously supplying utility and relevant services. The data sources include customer information systems (CIS) and billing data, interactive voice recognition (IVR) call management data, supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA), mobile crew management (MCM) data, automatic meter reading (AMR) data, automated vehicle location (AVL) data, engineering analysis data supported by 3^rd party software packages (such as load monitoring and balancing), etc. In particular, the system allows an on-site engineer to retrieve data (ex. field maps, work orders, codes) or enter, via a portable device, inspection data (ex. such as poles or underground facilities, code violations).

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for integrating and providing utility management information of an utility distribution system based upon data from a geographic information systems (GIS) database and data sources including a customer information data, billing data, interactive voice recognition (IVR) call management data, supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) data, mobile crew management (MCM) data, automatic meter reading (AMR) data, automated vehicle location (AVL) data, engineering analysis data supported by 3^rd party software packages, said computer-implemented method comprising:

importing and synchronizing said data from the GIS database and said sources so as to support on-demand queries for the utility management information, said importing-accomplished with a computer system,

displaying locations of vehicles based upon the AVL data, said displaying accomplished with a display of said computer system, and

executing, with said computer system, processes of;

(I) mapping parent outages of an electric distribution network of the utility distribution system in an electronic model map, determining a protective device nearest to one of the parent outages which was incorrectly predicted, splitting said one parent outage into one or more child outages, associating the child outages with said one parent outage, restoring one of the child outages thereby partially restoring at least one parent outage, automatically re-associating the restored child outage with the partially-restored parent outage, deleting said one parent outage from the map without entering said one parent outage in a historical outage log, counting said one parent outage and said one child outage only as one outage and associating affected customers and trouble calls in connection only with said one counted outage thereby automatically reducing an outage frequency which reflects system reliability, and

(II) decomposing the electric distribution network by phase into three single-phase electrical networks respectively represented in said computer system in the form of a searchable binary tree for each of the single-phase electrical networks, storing data of each of the three single-phase electrical networks in a cache memory of the utility distribution system, and displaying the electric distribution network on said display in a graphical user interface of said computer system as a logical overlay of the three single-phase electrical networks containing logical associations to single-line GIS representations of conductors, each of the single-line GIS representations of conductors including one line segment labeled only with a conductor ID and at least one phase attribute to reflect corresponding physical geometry of the electric distribution network, displaying secondary service lines between the conductors and customers extending from said line segments, displaying in-line protective devices on top of said line segment representing a conductor protected by the in-line protective devices, and processing and predicting outages by phase based upon stored data of the three single-phase electrical networks, said customers, and said in-line protective devices without tracing phase attribute data corresponding to said single-line GIS representations of conductors.

2. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising at least one step of:

modifying an outage or switching model, editing underlying data of said model based upon the on-demand queries.

3. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, wherein the (I) process further performs growing, additional splitting, combining, or shrinking outages based upon the on-demand queries.

4. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, a step of maintaining historical information to generate reliability indices.

5. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of historical outage tracking.

6. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of transmitting the on-demand queries via internet, intranet, or wirelessly from a remote site.

7. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of tracking work flow by collecting data modifications, job details, and graphical sketches.

8. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of predicting outage based the IVR call management data, the AMR data, or the SCADA data.

9. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of generating a customer callback list based upon an outage or a switching operation.

10. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of associating an outage with at least one voice message.

11. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of providing a point-and-click interface to at least one authorized user to assign and control tools and data access of other users to access the tools or data necessary for performing the users'"'"' daily work.

12. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of searching for a trouble call.

13. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of displaying locations of customers to receive a call back in a GIS graphic based upon a Callback list.

14. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of displaying the IVR call management data, the SCADA data, the MCM data, the AMR data, the AVL data, the engineering analysis data in a GIS graphic.

15. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of managing crews by district.

16. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of making speculative changes or permanent changes to data from the data sources imported to a work order and saving into a plurality of versions of the work order so as to simultaneously display selected versions by a user thereby allowing the user to analyze displayed versions.

17. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of building a crew by Crew Members, Equipment, Materials, Work order Assignments, Outage Assignments, Crew Current Physical Locations, and Skill Sets.

18. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of processing the IVR call management data, the supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) data, the mobile crew management (MCM) data, the automatic meter reading (AMR) data, and the automated vehicle location (AVL) data by any selected combination of districts.

19. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of sketching ad hoc graphics on top of a GIS graphic so as to associate a sketch with a work order.

20. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of defining work order types associated with outage types by a user thereby linking and updating outage data therein in work order headers.

21. The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, further comprising a step of automatically integrating the AVL data with other data.

22. A tangible computer readable storage medium comprising computer executable instructions tangibly embodied thereon which, when executed, cause a processor of a computer system to perform a method for integrating and providing utility management information for an utility distribution system based upon data from a geographic information systems (GIS) database and data sources including a customer information data, billing data, interactive voice recognition (IVR) call management data, supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) data, mobile crew management (MCM) data, automatic meter reading (AMR) data, automated vehicle location (AVL) data, engineering analysis data supported by 3^rd party software packages, the method comprising:

importing and synchronizing said data from the GIS database and said data sources so as to support on-demand queries for the utility management information, said importing accomplished with a computer system,

displaying near-real-time locations of vehicles based upon the AVL data, said displaying accomplished with a display of said computer system, and

decomposing the electric distribution network by phase into three single-phase electrical networks respectively represented in said computer system in the form of a searchable binary tree for each of the single-phase electrical networks, storing data of each of the three single-phase electrical networks in a cache memory of the utility distribution system, and displaying the electric distribution network on said display in a graphical user interface of said computer system as a logical overlay of the three single-phase electrical networks containing logical associations to single-line GIS representations of conductors, each of the single-line GIS representations of conductors including one line segment labeled only with a conductor ID and at least one phase attribute to reflect corresponding physical geometry of the electric distribution network, displaying secondary service lines between the conductors and customers extending from said line segments, displaying in-line protective devices on top of said line segment representing a conductor protected by the in-line protective devices, and processing and predicting outages by phase based upon stored data of the three single-phase electrical networks, said customers, and said in-line protective devices without tracing phase attribute data corresponding to said single-line GIS representations of conductors.

23. A tangible computer readable storage medium comprising computer executable instructions tangibly embodied thereon which, when executed, cause a processor of a computer system to perform a method for integrating and providing utility management information for an utility distribution system based upon data from a geographic information systems (GIS) database and data sources including a customer information data, billing data, interactive voice recognition (IVR) call management data, supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) data, mobile crew management (MCM) data, automatic meter reading (AMR) data, automated vehicle location (AVL) data, engineering analysis data supported by 3′

* party software packages, the method comprising;

importing and synchronizing said data from the GIS database and said data sources so as to support on-demand queries for the utility management information, said importing accomplished ith a computer system,

displaying on the computers rear-real-time locations of vehicles based upon the AVL data, said displaying accomplished with a display of said computer system, and

executing, with said computer system, processes of;

(I) mapping parent outages of an electric distribution network of the utility distribution system in an electronic model map, finding a protective device nearest to one of the parent outages which was incorrectly predicted, splitting said one parent outage into one or more child outages, associating the child outages with said one parent outage, restoring one of the child outages thereby partially restoring said one parent outage, automatically re-associating the restored child outage with the partially-restored parent outage, deleting said one parent outage from the map without entering said one parent outage in a historical outage log, counting said one parent outage and said one child outage only as one outage and associating affected customers and trouble calls in connection only with said one counted outage thereby automatically reducing an outage frequency which reflects system reliability, and

(II) decomposing the electric distribution network by phase into three single-phase electrical networks respectively represented in said computer system in the form of a searchable binary tree for each of the single-phase electrical networks, storing data of each of the three single-phase electrical networks in a cache memory of the utility distribution system, and displaying on said display in a graphical user interface of said computer system the electric distribution network as a logical overlay of the three single-phase electrical networks containing logical associations to single-line GIS representations of conductors, each of the single-line GIS representations of conductors including one line segment labeled only with a conductor ID and at least one phase attribute to reflect corresponding physical geometry of the electric distribution network, displaying secondary service lines between the conductors and customers extending from said line segments, displaying in-line protective devices on top of said line segment representing a conductor protected by the in-line protective devices, and processing and predicting outages by phase based upon stored data of the three single-phase electrical networks, said customers, and said in-line protective devices without tracing phase attribute data corresponding to said single-line GIS representations of conductors.

24. The tangible computer readable storage medium according to claim 23, wherein said method further comprises computer executable instructions for setting:

a threshold for how many downline customer calls are required to grow an outage to include an upstream device,

a set of conditions under which two isolated outages are to merge to a single outage, and

a set of conditions under which a single outage is to be decomposed into multiple outages.