OMS Implementation for Potomac Electric Power Company (PEPCO)

The Potomac Electric Power Company (PEPCO) based in Washington, DC, USA replaced its legacy Outage Management System (OMS) with CES International's Centricity System.  ExtenSys assisted CES International in various aspects of this implementation.
The new OMS interfaces with a number of other systems, including: GIS, Customer Information System, SCADA system, 21st Century High Volume Call Application (HVCA), and Mobile Data System (MDS).  In particular, ExtenSys was responsible for building the interface to the GIS, HVCA and MDS.

The Role of ExtenSys

In particular, ExtenSys was responsible for building the interface to the GIS, HVCA and MDS.

ArcGIS Object Model Design and Interface

ExtenSys assisted in customizing the ArcFM 8 object model to suit PEPCO's business requirements and ensure it supported the OMS.  ExtenSys also developed the interface between ArcGIS and Centricity.

This interface moves data from ArcGIS into Centricity on a frequency dictated by the business, but it is typically performed daily.  ExtenSys developed an Extractor program using ESRI's ArcObjects that detects changes to the GIS dataset and extracts data from affected areas in order to keep the OMS up-to-date.  The extractor is a general purpose program, so ExtenSys configured it for PEPCO.

The extracts are then preprocessed and run through the Centricity model builder.  ExtenSys wrote and configured the preprocessor.

High Volume Call Application Interface

The 21st Century HVCA System is used to take calls from PEPCO's customers when their Customer Service Representatives are overloaded and to automatically call back customers to confirm that their service has been restored after an outage.

The interface to the HVCA system is implemented using tables in the OMS' Oracle database.  These tables perform two functions:

• To request customer callbacks.
• To allow the HVCA to determine the current power status of a customer, according to the OMS' database.  This information allows the HVCA system to screen customer calls.

Mobile Dispatch System Interface

The transport mechanism between the two systems is the IBM MQSeries middleware.

When the OMS system determines that there is an outage, the interface to the MDS sends outage data in the form of trouble orders.  When the status of the outage changes in the OMS the interface sends these changes to the MDS to keep the field crews up to date.  In addition, when the field crews progress through their work, they inform the MDS of their status, and the interface sends this information to the OMS to keep the OMS operators up to date, and to allow this data to be saved for later processing and reporting.

As field crews log in, log out, and change their status, the interface keeps the OMS crew facilities up to date.  This allows the OMS to be used as a partial backup system if the MDS becomes unavailable for any reason.

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