Northbrook, IL, Jan. 7, 2002 -- AMRA's January 2002 Trials & Installations Report details 148 projects comprising 10.25 million AMR units at 140 utilities. The majority of projects are installations; utilities report only 11 trials involving less than 27,000 units.
Utility representatives say they plan to use AMR to boost competitive ability, enhance customer satisfaction and provide services such as outage and tamper detection, load-profiling, load management, customized billing, rate-based pricing, load management, distribution automation, and supervisory control and data acquisition.
Though the total number of projects included in the 2002 Trials & Installations Report is 16 percent lower than the 2001 report, many project managers sent information about new and expanded AMR initiatives. The 2002 report lists 64 new projects comprising nearly 3 million units and 32 expansions that add 300,000 units to ongoing installations.
Four utilities report installations of more than 1 million units:
-Atlanta Gas Light Co. began in 2001 to install a 1.3-million fixed-network and drive-by radio system designed to improve the utilities ability to influence usage patterns and understand customer needs.
-Northeast Utilities adds 50,000 units to its territory-wide hybrid AMR installation that already has more than a million units in the field and another half-million scheduled for deployment in the next two years.
-PECO Energy Co. leaders expand their fixed-network radio system by 100,000 units, with 1.3 million units now collecting information and another 800,000 planned for deployment in 2002.
-Leaders at Puget Sound Energy are building on the utility's highly successful customer-service initiatives enabled by a 1.5-million unit fixed-network radio system.
Electric/Gas Utilities Report Large Deployments; Water Sees Upsurge
Only nine combination electric/gas utilities reported AMR activities, but four are large-scale projects. Thus, electric/gas utilities take the lead in system deployment, with more than six million units in the field or scheduled for installation.
In addition to the three electric/gas deployments of more than one million units listed above, Wisconsin Electric-Wisconsin Gas is installing a 650,000-unit fixed-network radio system. In all, three electric/gas AMR projects use fixed-network radio systems, three use power-line communications, one uses dial-inbound, one uses walk-by radio and one uses a hybrid of technologies.
Electric utilities report the majority of deployment activity: 88 utility project managers are conducting 88 installations of nearly 1.7 million units and five trials of more than 14,000 units.
However, most of the projects involve fewer than 30,000 units; only five are installations of 100,000 or more units. The majority of projects--63--rely on PLC technology, 15 use dial-inbound, three use dial-outbound, two use radio technologies, two use fiber, one uses cable and seven use a hybrid of communications technologies.
Gas utilities report the third highest total of AMR units to be deployed. Thanks to Atlanta Gas Light's 1.5 million unit installation, the four gas projects in the January 2002 Trials & Installation Report comprise more than 1.6 million devices.
Two gas projects use mobile radio, one uses drive-by radio and one uses a combination of radio technologies.
Nearly one million AMR units are scheduled for deployment at 31 water utilities across North America. This activity level may seem low, but it indicates a surge of interest because 18 deployments, 58 percent of all water listings, are newly reported projects.
Radio continues to be the technology of choice for water utilities with 16 using fixed-network, seven using drive-by, four using mobile and two using a combination of radio technologies. Only two utilities report non-radio AMR systems: one uses a hybrid of technologies and another reports a joint deployment with a local electric company that uses PLC.
Combination utilities other than electric/gas report 11 projects involving just more than 200,000 units. Three systems use PLC, two use drive-by radio, two use a hybrid of technologies, one uses fixed-network radio, one uses drive-by radio, one uses dial-inbound and one uses satellite.
Compiling the 2002 AMRA Trials & Installations Report
The January 2002 Trials & Installations Report is a compilation of pilots and installations that occurred in 2001 or are planned for 2002 and beyond. The update also provides modifications of unclear or imprecise listings that appeared in July 2001 Trials & Installations Update.
Representatives of utilities and utility-service companies verify all data that appears in AMRA reports. If your utility is involved with an advanced metering deployment that project managers would like to appear in future reports, contact AMRA headquarters.
The January 2002 Trials & Installations Report does not list deployments completed before 2001. For this data, refer to previous AMRA reports and updates. The annual Trials & Installations Report is an AMRA member benefit; each member receives one copy. Purchase extra copies online at www.amra-intl.org or contact AMRA headquarters at 847-480-9628 or [email protected] for more information.
The AMRA 2002 International Symposium is scheduled for September 29 through October 2 at Henry Gonzalez Convention Center in San Antonio, Texas.
