
	June 2008

Itron Enterprise Edition Meter Data Management Scales to 9 Million Meters on Microsoft SQL Server

Another successful round of scalability and performance benchmark testing is complete for Itron Enterprise Edition™ (IEE) Meter Data Management (MDM).

Itron, Microsoft® and Infosys® worked together to execute the latest high-volume benchmark on SQL Server® 2005 and SQL Server 2008, culminating in independent verification of the product's scalability. The test comprised 4.5 million meters with

half-hourly data, a volume equivalent to hourly data for 9 million meters. Over 200 million intervals of data were imported in each test. The goal was to ensure IEE MDM performance not only meets the current needs of large utility companies, but can also scale as Itron customers deploy increasingly sophisticated large-scale advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) solutions.

Said Julie Hance, vice president of software services at Itron, "In all cases Microsoft, Infosys and Itron were able to verify that Itron's MDM solution does, in fact, meet and exceed all the required performance and scalability demands for data import necessary to satisfy large-scale installations upward of 9 million residential AMI hourly interval meters. Working together, Itron and Microsoft were able to establish that its architecture will scale to meet the future, growing needs of customers."

The outcome of the benchmark tests demonstrated that IEE on SQL Server 2005 needs less than two hours to validate, auto-estimate, and import 4.5 million half-hourly meters each having one register and one interval channel. The test encompassed a total of 3.02 billion intervals per day, which equals 35,000 intervals per second including calculating estimations for 0.5 percent of the meters. While the majority of tests were run on SQL Server 2005, the database was migrated and the tests rerun on SQL Server 2008. Overall validation/estimation/import results improved by approximately 10 percent on SQL Server 2008 compared to SQL Server 2005.

"Working with Itron and Infosys, we've shown that the mission-critical IEE MDM application is uniquely positioned to work on the Microsoft platform with the SQL Server database solution, offering utilities scale, performance and a lower total cost of ownership," said Larry Kuhl, worldwide utilities business development and alliance manager at Microsoft.

"We are pleased to have had the opportunity to work with Itron and Microsoft on this important test," said Ankush Patel, vice president of Infosys' utilities practice. "These results will play a key role in the continuing success of our IEE MDM training taking place in our Worldwide AMI Center of Excellence in India."

The benchmarks were conducted at Microsoft's lab in Redmond, Wash., and were completed entirely on HP hardware. Itron introduced IEE MDM in 2003 and has since completed benchmarks of comparable size on other database systems. IEE MDM is the industry's leading multi-vendor platform solution for maximizing the value of utility metering and AMI data. It's currently in use at 40 utilities around the world, representing more than 23 million contracted meters.

Want to learn more about the benefits of IEE MDM? Click here.

Itron Hosting and Software Solutions Help Imperial Irrigation District Reduce System Stress and Provide Greater Reliability

Opportunity
Like all utilities, Imperial Irrigation District's (IID) residential electricity customers expect that when they flip the switch on in their homes, that the lights remain on until they turn them off. The same is true for the district's larger agricultural, commercial and industrial (C&I) users. Especially in terms of its agriculture customers; IID provides energy to the lower southeastern portion of California's desert where these customers generate over $1 billion in vegetable and melon crops annually. To air condition their large warehouses and coolers, they depend on IID to deliver this indispensable resource without fail, regardless of the circumstances. In other words, what IID provides to its energy customers is reliability.

As the sixth-largest consumer-owned utility in the state, this dependability must stretch across an impressive 6,471 square miles, including all of Imperial County along with parts of Riverside and San Diego counties. This constitutes an average of 140,000 electrical bills issued annually—a figure that's expected to double by 2015. Combining this rapid growth with IID's expansive, desert landscape, the challenge becomes maintaining a constant state of readiness—and predictability—inside and outside the organization, so that when changes occur, the utility is poised to change with them. This ultimately became the foundation for a meter initiative launched by IID in 2005, Rate Implementation for Time-of-Use: Meters to Cash Project.

Bolstering the initiative were aging electromechanical meters and manual meter reading, both of which began impeding IID and its ability to protect the flow of progress. Additionally, they had no way to effectively encourage agricultural and other C&I customers to eliminate consumption during peak periods, or even shift their energy usage to off-peak periods, which would allow IID to operate its facilities more efficiently. The rate analysis group also needed a vehicle for implementing new rate structures; they were falling behind compared to the rest of the industry.

Compounding the issue, IID's remote location has always made recruiting new talent difficult, resulting in few qualified staff to support new technologies and IT infrastructure. This was in addition to the fiscal complexities many consumer-owned utilities face in an effort to keep rates for customers low.

"Staffing and budgetary constraints go hand-in-hand," says Shane Jones, a business analyst for IID. "We have a limited pool of resources to draw from for adding systems and any new technology ultimately puts a lot of stress on our department."

This changed the dynamic of an initiative that originally only took into account replacing meters and reading processes. The utility began looking for an IP-based remote meter reading solution that utilized hosted software. The hosted solution would need to work in conjunction with IID's existing billing system while integrating its various data collection technologies — without requiring additional expertise or more staff in the field. The new system would need inherent time-of-use (TOU) functionality to lessen peak demand and peak usage by C&I users and also web-based presentation to allow customers to analyze usage patterns. Relying on the previous success of Itron's MV-RS^® data collection system for its keyed reads, and prior satisfaction with Itron's staff and support, IID again looked to Itron.

Solution
IID elected to have Itron install and configure its software in Itron's Oakland data center, affording the utility with the fully-hosted solution it desired. From Oakland, Itron performs meter data collection and processing and sends files to the utility's billing system. Also included in the service is hardware administration, back office processes and system administration of IID's meters.

This was made possible with IID's purchase of:

400 CENTRON^® and SENTINEL^® IP-addressable meters from Itron

MV-90 xi Service Mode, Itron's proven solution for interval data collection, management and analysis for C&I metering devices

Itron Enterprise Edition (IEE)™ Meter Data Management to validate and process its data and translate it complete with date and timestamp for billing export to MV-RS format for use in IID's internal systems

IEE Customer Care, enabling web-based, self-service access for the utility and its end-customers for viewing account, meter and consumption information

"When Itron revealed the true depth of their offering including hosted software and meter reading services complete with data applications, we jumped at the opportunity," says Raquel Lopez, a utility rate analyst with IID. The utility was so pleased in fact that the hosting contract—initially only planned for the pilot program—eventually turned into a long-term arrangement.

IID's board of directors approved two pilot TOU rates, which impacted just a small number of its large commercial class to start. Some of which were those agricultural cooling customers to encourage off-peak consumption. IID also offered innovative pricing to a group of commercial customers with 2MW of energy usage annually.

Benefits
"Our rate payers pay our salary," says Lopez. "Our goal was to look for the best possible deal and service for our money in executing our program, and Itron was very helpful in this aspect."

Dividends have also been realized in terms of staffing. No additional employees or expertise were required on-site to maintain the new systems. Via hosting, Itron is able to manage meter change requests as field conditions change. What's more, the system can be converted to an in-house system at a future date, if desired.

Aside from cost, the flexibility of Itron's software has allowed IID to import register and interval data from a non-Itron automated meter reading (AMR) system, an added benefit. IID has achieved successful evaluation of new metering technologies in a way that optimizes the existing system processing and interfaces, which mitigates risk.

The utility's use of Itron technology has gained accolades from its third largest customer, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR). The prison and its affiliates throughout California all have different ways for managing and viewing their energy consumption. Word traveled quickly regarding IEE Customer Care and its rich set of analytical tools, proactive alerts and scheduled reports. Says Harry Franey, chief for the energy management and sustainability section at CDCR, "We compared Itron's system to what our colleagues had in place to view their energy use and the other prison systems were very envious of how plainly and simply our data was presented. They liked the color, graph and bar variations; flexibility in looking at demand, or kWh, or both; and viewing by time and weekday versus weekend."

Future plans for the utility include rolling out permanent time-of-use rates to its large commercial customers with 350 kW of consumption or more per year. Eventually, IID would like to redesign and restructure many of its current rates and implement various new rates and structures, which would involve smart meter infrastructure and technology. The IID Rates Unit is actively pursuing smart metering for a small residential sample group, collecting interval data to further expand its rate analysis and better understand how changes impact its customers.

Says Lopez, "We want to encourage changes in our customers' energy usage patterns by providing metering technology and tools that are easily accessible and understandable. These tools must also be dynamic enough to make a customer want to change the way they use energy. Itron has afforded us this opportunity—to educate our customers on energy conservation, to shift energy load during critical peak periods and understand energy usage patterns. This allows our utility to maintain our goal in reducing stress to our system load as well as providing greater reliability—all to the ultimate benefit of our customers."

Online Tools for Environmental Awareness

In previous editions of this series, you read how Itron Enterprise Edition™ (IEE) Customer Care solutions help consumers save money, encourage demand response and improve customer service. Another component of these solutions is increasing awareness of emissions and helping the environment by encouraging savings.

IEE Customer Care provides an online view of an end-use customer's electric, water and gas usage at an interval (hour-by-

hour) basis. It also provides information about energy cost, and provides the tools consumers need to help optimize use, shift load, and conserve energy. Studies have shown that when consumers have visibility into their energy and water usage and the associated costs, they are more likely to implement conservation strategies.

For each kilowatt-hour of energy saved, approximately 1.5 pounds of carbon dioxide, plus smaller amounts of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxide and mercury are spared from going into the atmosphere by reduced burning of fuels at power plants. Shifting load from on-peak to off-peak can also reduce emissions, as the on-peak energy tends to require a greater percentage of fossil fuels; while off-peak energy tends to have a greater mix of wind, water and solar-based sources.

Natural gas also creates carbon dioxide emissions — about 11.7 pounds per therm. And water usage results in depletion of freshwater, as well as use of significant amounts of electricity needed to process and pump the water. With its detailed reporting capabilities, Customer Care users are able to better understand the impact of their energy and water consumption and adjust their usage patterns accordingly.

Energy conservation and load shifting saves more than just carbon-emitting fuel. It reduces — or at least delays — the need for energy assets. Using less energy on-peak means fewer peaking plants, and less need for transmission lines to transmit all that peak power. Generation plants require energy to extract and transport materials, construct, and deliver that energy to wherever it needs to go. Fuel needs to be shipped to the plant, and waste products need to be processed and shipped away from the plant. Even solar and wind plants require significant amounts of energy just to be built. Clearly, a "negawatt" is the cleanest energy possible.

Itron's end-user tools — Enterprise Energy Management™ Suite and IEE Mass Market Customer Care — provide consumers information about emissions avoided based on energy savings. Imagine the savings if everyone took a closer look at their usage profile, and made the small changes that not only save money, but save the environment.

For more information about IEE Customer Care, please click here.

A Closer Look at Itron Enterprise Edition™: 2008 Itron Users' Conference Events

As in years past, the 2008 Itron Users' Conference will again feature both informational and technical sessions on Itron Enterprise Edition (IEE), the market leading solution for the collection, validation, calculation and management of utility metering data for advanced metering infrastructure (AMI), automated meter reading (AMR), and commercial and industrial (C&I) metering deployments.

The IEE track covers everything from common techniques to

configure, tailor and customize IEE applications, to benchmark results for high volume MDM installations, to the role IEE meter data management plays in the implementation strategy for meeting unique AMI requirements, to customer presentment and demand response. The IEE track offers 19 courses to choose from throughout the three day conference. As utilities move toward more frequent meter data measurement and collection, there is a greater need to manage such data and leverage it enterprise-wide. The IEE sessions will discuss key business drivers for deploying an enterprise meter data management system and explore a variety of ways in which utilities can leverage the data to offer new customer programs, improve customer service and lower costs. IEE customers will speak about their strategy and experiences along with panel sessions discussing trends and strategies in deploying a meter data management system for both AMI and C&I implementations.

New this year, Itron is also offering post-conference users' forums for Itron Enterprise Edition. Three sessions are being offered:

Itron Enterprise Edition Meter Data Management Users' Forum

Itron Enterprise Edition Customer Care Users' Forum

Itron Enterprise Edition Curtailment Manager Users' Forum

For more information on the Itron Users' Conference, please start here: http://www.itron.com/usersconference