Alabama Power Implements New Alstom Distribution Management System

Alstom has delivered a new Distribution Management System (DMS) to Alabama Power which is now operational, and efficiently directing the flow of electricity to 1.4 million customers. The DMS and its distribution SCADA system use Smart Grid technology to improve work processes and crew safety. In the future, it is expected to decrease outage durations. Alstom’s Outage Management System (OMS) will go online at Alabama Power, a subsidiary of Atlanta-based Southern Company, later this year, completing delivery of the company’s full Integrated Distribution Management System (IDMS).

The new DMS, which is based on Alstom Grid’s e-terradistribution 3.0 technology, provides Alabama Power’s distribution grid operators with increased functionality. During normal operations, electronic switch order preparation is faster and more accurate than manual operations used in the past. Tasks that previously took 30 minutes can now be done in a matter of a few minutes. Safety is enhanced because operators can quickly create and validate switching orders in ‘study mode’ to ensure accuracy before dispatching to crews in the field. Additional DMS functions will be deployed to the company’s grid operators in 2013 and are expected to provide additional benefits to Alabama Power and its customers.

“The goals and criteria defined by Alabama Power Company at the onset of this project enabled us to develop a new, customer inspired IDMS architecture that tightly integrates the operations of SCADA, DMS and OMS functions into a single user interface with advanced grid optimization applications,” said Karim El Naggar, Alstom Grid Vice President, Network Management Solutions.