Indiana
Indiana Michigan Power began a gridSMART® pilot project in South Bend, Ind. This pilot project began with equipment installations in late 2008 and was concluded in the third quarter of 2010 at a capital cost of approximately $7 million. The project was supported by regulators and incorporated nearly 10,000 smart meters, distribution automation, time-of-use pricing options, load control and related technologies, and a customer energy use web portal. The original project timeline was extended into 2010 in order to gather additional data in order to more fully evaluate the new programs and technology.

An evaluation of the project was prepared in cooperation with the Indiana Office of Utility Consumer Council and jointly presented to the Indiana Regulatory Commission. Findings indicated that the distribution automation equipment works favorably by increasing customer reliability and the automated metering infrastructure also works well. But the lack of customer interest and participation in special rates indicates more education is needed to help consumers understand how to use the meters.
 
Ohio
AEP Ohio is conducting a larger and more comprehensive gridSMART® demonstration project involving approximately 110,000 customers in central Ohio. The $150 million project is being funded in part with a $75 million grant from the U.S. DOE, vendor in-kind donations and cost recovery support from regulators. It includes smart meters, distribution automation equipment to better manage the grid, community energy storage devices, smart appliances and a new cyber security center.

Plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs) are part of the Ohio gridSMART® pilot. We will operate 10 PEVs in the pilot area to determine how their charging characteristics affect the grid. Two hundred customers may be eligible for an incentive of up to $2,500 to pay for charging infrastructure. One challenge our industry faces is the unknown effect that the widespread use of PEVs will have on our grid. This pilot will help us to understand PEV requirements better and prepare for the future.

A utility-activated control technology, called Volt/Var, will be deployed to manage the voltage level of service to customers. This technology is estimated to achieve a 2 percent to 4 percent reduction in demand and energy consumption without requiring customers to take action. The project will also pair time-of-use rates with in-home energy use displays, such as programmable, two-way communicating thermostats, and smart grid-enabled appliances that have the potential to help customers save even more energy and money. 

Working with major appliance manufacturers, we are testing smart appliances in our Dolan Lab in Groveport, Ohio. These appliances react to signals from the grid about price and demand. With homeowner consent, the dishwasher may “decide” not to run until 7 p.m. or the refrigerator may delay a defrost cycle until evening, when demand for electricity and prices are lower. Smart appliances have the potential to help residential customers save energy and money, and help AEP to reduce emissions.

Oklahoma
PSO was awarded an $8.75 million low-interest loan from the Oklahoma Department of Commerce’s federal stimulus fund to launch a gridSMART® pilot. This pilot will include up to 15,000 smart meters and an evaluation of consumer energy monitoring devices and their effect on energy consumption. The total cost of the program is estimated at $17.9 million.

The project started in August 2010 and will be fully implemented by the middle of 2012. The initial phase will replace approximately 13,200 meters with smart meters and establish a network for two-way communication. Subsequent phases of the project will include development of a Website for customers where they will be able to access their usage information and learn more about the benefits of smart meters, and how they can use energy more efficiently. Other technologies will be included in the pilot project, such as integrated Volt/Var, technology to achieve energy savings, and distribution technology that will help to reduce customer outages.

Texas
The Public Utility Commission of Texas enacted an advanced meter rule in 2007 that allows utilities to recover the cost of installing smart meters. AEP Texas filed a deployment along with $1 million of energy-use display devices for low-income customers. The $308 million project is expected to be completed by the end of 2013 and we will recover the costs from our customers over an 11-year period.

The Texas project will allow customers to see their energy usage in 15-minute increments on a dedicated website. It also will allow us to connect and disconnect customers remotely, reducing the need to go to a customer’s home or business to do it manually. Reducing these trips has many benefits such as lowering costs to serve customers, reducing the number of vehicle miles traveled and lessening the safety risk to our employees through meter operation activities. Another potential benefit of this project is that future integration of meter data with outage management systems will give us information about outages much faster, enabling shorter service restoration times. Retail electric providers are expected to use the AEP Texas architecture as a foundation for new rate structures and consumer programs in the state.