MEDIA RELEASE PR42052
IBM and Shanghai Electric Power to Pilot New Smart Grid
SHANGHAI, Nov. 5, 2010 /PRNewswire-AsiaNet/ --
IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced that it has developed a new technology, now piloted with Shanghai Power,
to help energy companies manage power outages more effectively while improving productivity. Developed for the
energy industry by IBM Research, the technology can upgrade and transform a power grid by reducing outage
frequency and duration of black-out time while optimizing the company's resources and assets.
Working with consultants and researchers from IBM, Shanghai Electric Power Company (Shanghai Power) has
installed the Integrated Distribution Outage Planner (IDOP) as it is transforming its power grid to minimize power
outages. These outages can jeopardize network reliability and service quality for its customers and as one of the
largest power companies in Asia, Shanghai Power generates more than 20 billion kilowatt per hour of electricity per
year.
Since the project was completed earlier this year, the rate of equipment availability at Shanghai Power has
increased significantly, and the company's sale of electricity has increased by 50 million kWh per month, which is
equal to an incremental revenue of 35 million Yuan (US$5.1 million) a month.
The grid system upgrade is especially critical for the company - the main supplier of electricity to Shanghai - as it
is hosting World Expo 2010. With the help of the new smart grid, Shanghai Power is able to ensure reliable and
secure power delivery.
Maintenance scheduling is one of the most vital daily jobs for a power company. Since maintenance is often
done manually, power outages can occur at a more frequent rate. Shanghai Power, for example, performs 5,000 to
6,000 maintenance tasks and tests every month. The company wanted to use IDOP to automate the inter-
departmental processes to ensure better management of maintenance so that outage risk is minimized.
IDOP, an online, real-time outage-planning tool, integrates data from relevant departments and processes and
manages the schedule of different types of power outage tasks. Using IBM's analytics and optimization technology,
IDOP allows the power grid to draw data across the company to conduct analysis of possible factors causing
outage and excessive energy consumption. It also can provide scientific arrangements of outage tasks, including
the time frame and load transfer path for each outage task. This helps to minimize security risks, increase workload
balance, and reduce the amount of time spent on monthly coordination of scheduled power outages from half a
month to just a few days.
"Based on IBM's analytics and optimization techniques, IDOP is an innovative offering to help the energy &
utilities industry address large scale and complex grid challenges," said Dr. Thomas Li, Director of IBM Research -
China & CTO, IBM Greater China Group. "IBM is proud to support Shanghai Power in implementing this significant
and ground breaking tool, which is China's first province-wide IT platform of its kind."
The IDOP project is part of IBM Research's First-Of-A-Kind program (FOAK) where IBM engages clients' experts
in research projects to explore how emerging technologies could solve real industry problems. The collaboration
exemplifies IBM's commitment to being part of the industry ecosystem supporting clients and business partners to
solve industry-specific issues.
China's energy demand is expected to grow at about 5.5 percent per year through to 2020, and the Chinese
government has allocated US$7.3 billion to energy system reform.
About Shanghai Electric Power Company (Shanghai Power)
A listed company on Shanghai Securities Exchange Center, Shanghai Power operates in Shanghai and the
Jiangsu province. It is the largest power company in Shanghai. For further details about Shanghai Power, visit:
About IBM
IBM is involved in more than 150 Smart Grid engagements in mature and emerging markets. More about IBM's
vision to bring a new level of intelligence to how the world works - how every person, business, organization,
government, natural system, and man-made system interacts, can be found here:
For more information about Smarter Energy at IBM, please visit: http://www.ibm.com/press/smarterenergy
Media Contacts
Harriet Ip
IBM Growth Markets Unit External Relations
65-6418-1521 / 65-8161-8505
harrieti@sg.ibm.com
Emily Horn
IBM Corporate External Relations
415.545.2634
horne@us.ibm.com
SOURCE: IBM
CONTACT: Harriet Ip
IBM Growth Markets Unit External Relations
+65-6418-1521
or +65-8161-8505
harrieti@sg.ibm.com
Emily Horn
IBM Corporate External Relations
+1-415-545-2634
horne@us.ibm.com
both of IBM
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