Validér AS, a service provider formed by 21 grid companies in western Norway, has entered a strategic business agreement with Powel AS, a software and services provider for the energy sector. Through the contract, Powel and its project sub-suppliers Oracle and e-vita, will provide the IT platform needed for implementing the largest smart metering project in Norway to date, initially including 400.000 smart metering points.
“I have great expectations for the IT platform and not least Powel as the main supplier and partner in the years to come” said Thomas Thiis, CEO at Validér. “I am convinced that with this new platform we will be able to offer a cost effective and reliable service of Advanced Metering Systems (AMS) for our existing and future shareholders and customers.”
The introduction of smart metering for end-customers allows for automated recording of the customer’s electric energy consumption in intervals of an hour or less. The meter recordings will be collected using the Powel ELIN system improving process automation, monitoring and control of the distribution system. In addition to measuring electrical consumption the system will gather information of the voltage level, improve outage management and help identify any earth failures. As a result, these features will provide the grid companies with necessary and significantly improved information for planning, operating and maintain the medium- and low-voltage distribution system.
Powel’s offering supports a wide variety of meter types and communication technologies – functionality that is central for the success of the Validér concept. It fully supports advanced metering management processes, independent of meter brand and communication protocol. In this way, Powel is able to provide the flexibility needed for successfully and securely managing a project of this scale now and in the future.
Validér will act as the service provider for smart meter operations and will manage and operate Powel’s system for collection and processing of all metering data. The company will provide and support the integration of the central system to elhub.no and the grid companies, ERP and Network Information Systems (NIS).
”Since the Powel solution allows us to manage the entire operation, from data collection and validation of meter data to exception handling and enabling of events and alarms through the same platform, we are able to streamline automated processes and services”, Thomas Thiis said. ”Also, we are impressed by the top references that Powel were able to provide from other large scale implementations in Europe.
For Powel, the new deal is an important milestone on its home market.
“As metering systems become more and more intelligent, players like Validér increasingly embrace the potential of offering new and efficient services based on the opportunities that flexible and open solutions can provide,” Bård Benum, CEO at Powel said. There is a lot happening in this space at the moment and we are happy to see that Norway is leading the way”.
