Issue link: https://fhpublishing.uberflip.com/i/736974
NETWORK / 27 / OCTOBER 2016 competition and network innovation allowance, but the technologies explored in these projects are the technologies of tomorrow rather than today. While it is important that networks prepare themselves for such a future, innovation is done at the cost of consumers and a real impact on business as usual activity is oen used as the marker of success. Ofgem's senior technical adviser Gurpal Singh questioned whether the balance between the long-term vision and immediate gains is right. Asset management is the focus of many of the smaller and cheaper NIA projects, but as asset management forms up to 40% of the price control Ofgem would like to see more done in the bigger projects to allow this funding to be decreased in future price controls. Projects that do have an asset management theme, such as National Grid's Project GRAID, are focussed on improving the visibility of asset condition on the network. The project is endeavouring to develop a remotely controlled robot which will be able to visually inspect buried high pressure transmis- sion pipelines and collect other data on asset health. As one speaker remarked; energy networks have never been shy about collecting data. "Sometimes we do it for fun, from what I can see" he quipped. But this data needs to have a purpose; it needs to enlighten and challenge existing practices, and for that networks will need to innovate internally. One such example is by Wales and West Utilities, in collaboration with the other GDNs, in determining where to target investment. Data is used to assess the likelihood of a consequence happening, and that consequence is given a financial value. In this way risk can be monetised and should result in a more accurate financial settlement in the next price control. This is obviously a step forward, but has had unexpected consequences. The Sound biteS: "In many circumstances, not just in this sector, our predictions for the future are based on the past and this is not something that is sustainable in a world where the climate is changing so rapidly. So one of the things I think we could potentially see is data analytics taking advantage of the new stream of data that is coming from global sources." Carlo Buontempo, sectoral information system manager, European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts "We spend a lot of money replacing iron mains each year, its mandated by the HSE, it follows some quite significant explosions and some awful deaths which triggered this programme, but it's quite an emotional reason for a programme. When you monetise the risk for it, the carbon and environmental impact by far dwarfs anything else that would drive this programme. This is really good for us, because it allows us to demonstrate why we are spending money on iron mains, its more than just the very very slight chance of explosion and death, there are much wider benefits which customers can see. " Ian Dunstan, asset strategy and performance manager, Wales and West Utilities "The question we have to ask ourselves is; as DNOs are we the best people to innovate with that information with that information to make it tell people different things, or are we actually brave enough to put that information in the public domain. So that if somebody wants to connect a generator they go off and do it. I don't think at the moment that the DNOs are necessarily the best people to lead that." Iain Miller, head of innovation, Northern Powergrid "I think the penny only dropped relatively late that data is not only an input, but data itself should be subject to that process. The same disciplines that you put into how do I manage and monitor my asset needs to be applied to the data. What we are starting to work out is to think about the longevity of data and the validity of data. There is a huge danger in using out of date data." Jonathan Booth, head of asset management, Electricity North West "Siemens are a provider to a lot of industries, such as manufacturing. Comparing the methodologies they apply in other sectors, energy is not as advanced. This is despite the UK energy network being the second most complex infrastructure built in the world after the internet, but we are still behind in producing this data. It's all due to the lifespan of the assets. Rainer Nies, global director data and advisory services, Siemens AG