There are significant pressures to control spending growth throughout healthcare, government and higher education. These forces are pushing organizations to identify innovative ways to provide the same (or better) service for their customers and constituents while trimming costs and improving inefficient processes.

There are a variety of ways to attack this challenge, and the common thread is that many ideas for savings fall within areas that don’t have a “direct” impact on the organizations’ constituents like providing direct patient care, educating university students or staffing air traffic controllers. Instead, cost savings initiatives are focused on indirect, or supporting, areas of the organization. While reducing spending in the facilities and infrastructure management areas is a viable option, it is vital that the reliability, safety and security of the infrastructure are not negatively compromised. Whether a hospital, university, or government base, an energy management framework and connected system is fundamental to optimize the efficiency of assets.

The key objectives of such a system are to reduce energy/labor costs and improve the reliability, performance and security of the energy infrastructure in large campus environments, which typically comprise several buildings. When the staffing levels or resources supporting facility operations are cut, there are considerations that need to be managed —specifically, ensuring that service levels don’t drop in understaffed areas. By leveraging proven technology, organizations can bridge the gap in reduced staffing with tools that enable improved monitoring and increased service levels like energy efficiency, emergency power availability and power system readiness.

We recently had the opportunity to work with a client to provide a performance report highlighting testing and reliability performance across the enterprise. This type of dashboard and system-critical intelligence would have previously been challenging to obtain, but now with energy asset management technology, the client can obtain instant feedback regarding the overall preparedness of their critical energy infrastructure. It saved time and labor costs by automating the testing of energy assets, and also provides a campus wide view of metrics relating to the security and readiness of the critical energy infrastructure.

Performance Report Download System Test Report Download

Marshall VanNahmen
Director of Solutions Development
Blue Pillar, Inc.
Direct: (317) 723.6961
Mobile: (317) 771.8136
Office: (888) 234.3212
marshall.vannahmen@bluepillar.com

TAGS: Healthcare, Government, Higher Education, Business Intelligence, Portfolio Risk Management, Reliability

Contention Number One
For starters, SCADA began as a graphical display for monitoring a single RTU (remote terminal unit) or PLC (programmable logic controller) via a serial cable. Today it has evolved to facilitate command and control capabilities of. networks of RTUs, meters, and communication equipment.

Unfortunately as SCADA made this transition, it missed some important steps such as the underlying communication protocols upon which it is based. Modbus as an example was originally designed as a local master-slave communications standard designed to allow a “master” device to retrieve information from a secondary device. Fast forward this humble beginning to the networking infrastructure we have to come to simply expect today and the protocol is the same, but the medium through which it travels is vastly different.

The class of protocols that have their origins in serial communications have absolutely no security and remedies that attempt to secure the use of these protocols are not only clunky; they are simply not foolproof. In this respect, SCADA falls short and rather than helping customers increase security, it is actually increasing the attack surfaces within their facilities; something you never want to see in critical energy infrastructures. M2M technology has made some strides in this evolutionary process in the market spaces of energy microgrids, unlike SCADA systems, which continue to struggle to manage the growing complexity of DER (distributed energy resources).

The challenge for SCADA lies not only within the monitoring process, but actually the optimization aspect that involves a wide array of resources integrated into a single smart digital energy network. Clearly there is an opportunity that goes beyond SCADA capabilities and provides the ability to solve grid reliability and peak demand contingencies at the local distribution grid node level. Engineers and automation professionals familiar with SCADA have begun to understand and appreciate the true value that comes with the implementation of a digital energy network and its ability to boost system efficiency, maximize the ROI (return on investment) in customer-owned generation and other DER assets, and ultimately, ensure the highest level of business operational up-time.

There is a dire need today to transform the way we manage energy consumption. Our nation is waving goodbye to inefficient utility control systems or legacy SCADAs plagued by slow reaction speeds, incompatibility and isolation, which is due in part to the establishment of the ARRA (American Recovery and Reinvestment Act). Instead, we alongside other M2M partners are working to develop the proper communication standards and approaches necessary in managing and enabling energy micro-grids.

Contention Number Two
The second problem with SCADA is its reliance on customization. By design, SCADA software is custom—someone has to write code, draw screens, and test applications to produce a working, fully functional product for the end customer. Typically, there is little overlap from one client implementation to the next, so each customer receives its own ”code.”

To begin with, custom-coded systems are very difficult to test. Testing is usually limited to the go-live test at the end of a project due to the complexity and limited time available for testing. Once tested and commissioned (assuming it was all clear, which is a big assumption) the next difficulty encountered is maintenance and modification. Custom code is difficult to maintain over time and leaves customers in a predicament as their infrastructure and/or system needs change. More often than not, the practical life cycle for a fully implemented SCADA system is two to three years after which occurs an ever increasing irrelevance. All of this translates to increased risk, higher costs and time lost.

In general, customers are happy to get a solution built just for them. But if you think about it, it’s akin to deciding to build your own car instead of visiting your local car dealer. The car on that lot underwent years of design, processing, and testing prior to the manufacturer turning out a single unit. Similarly in the digital energy network environment, affordability is also achieved via scale; something you just don’t receive with SCADA.

Contention Number Three
The third problem with SCADA is hardware. SCADA hardware most often is represented as programmable gateways or PLCs that share many of the same issues as the SCADA software itself; very custom and once implemented, very inflexible. That means if you went to Bob for a custom PLC panel for controlling your widget maker and collecting data, and your business requirements change (or you have a component break), you’d better hope you can find Bob.

To Sum it Up
There is a paradigm shift in the energy sector from SCADA to turnkey platforms of subsystems that securely consolidates and centrally manages the monitoring of an organization’s disparate energy assets. In addition, there will be a shift to the enterprise-wide management of energy networks allowing for better equipped campus environment microgrids, demand response programs, and virtual power plants. Lastly the systems that don’t require large amounts of customization and engineering reduce many of the issues involving security, time to implementation, maintainability, and cost; all of which are key factors that most organizations are grappling with today. Unfortunately companies have invested a great deal of time and money in SCADA, so letting go of it can be particularly difficult. But the time is rapidly approaching when holding onto it may be even more agonizing.

Link to the resource

For starters, SCADA began as a single-terminal system monitoring a single remote terminal unit (RTU) or programmable logic controller (PLC) via a serial cable. Today, it has evolved to monitor a network of RTUs, meters, and communication equipment with multiple user terminal points.

Unfortunately, as SCADA made this transition, it missed some important steps. The Modbus protocol is a good example. Modbus was originally designed as a local master-slave communications standard used to allow a local PC to request information from an RTU or PLC through a dedicated communication cable. Fast forward to the IP-based world we live in: the protocol is the same, but the medium through which it travels is vastly different (i.e., Ethernet over the Web). This causes all sorts of vulnerability problems, something you never want to see in critical energy infrastructures.

The second problem with SCADA is its reliance on customization. By design, SCADA software is custom—someone has to write code, draw screens, and test applications to produce a working, fully configured product for the end customer. Typically, there is little overlap from one client implementation to the next, so each customer gets its own “code.”

The difficulty with this degree of customization initially is testing. It’s usually limited to the go-live test at the end of the project because there’s simply too much complexity and not enough time to test the way you would if you were building a product. Once tested and commissioned, the next difficulty is maintenance and modification. Custom code is difficult to maintain over time and leaves customers in a predicament as their infrastructure or usage related to the SCADA system changes. All of this translates to risk and cost.

In general, customers are happy to get a solution built just for them. But if you think about it, it’s akin to deciding to build your own car instead of visiting your local car dealer. The car on that lot underwent years of design, processing, and testing prior to the manufacturer turning out a single unit. Affordability is also achieved via scale; something you don’t receive with SCADA.

The third problem with SCADA is hardware. Nearly all of the hardware that the industrial automation world provides to allow for custom integration and communication can be summarized like this: a network-based CPU with I/O communicating with other devices via Modbus TCP requiring custom programming. That means if you went to Bob for a custom PLC panel for controlling your widget maker and collecting data, and your business requirements change (or you have a component break), you’d better hope you can find Bob.

In this series, I’ll discuss a number of specific issues with SCADA, including security, time to implementation, maintainability, and cost. Companies have invested a great deal of time and money in this technology, so letting go of it can be difficult. But the time is rapidly approaching when holding onto it may be even more agonizing.

Brad Witter, Executive Vice President Technology and Operations
888-234-3212
brad.witter@bluepillar.com

You’d first have to decide what best practices would be involved. Here are the items we think you’d need to include:

1. Deployment of an energy-asset portfolio management system to provide real-time and predictive load analysis and the ability to dispatch assets to shape that load. Objective: use on-site assets to smooth load profile and save money, especially demand charges.

2. Predictive asset maintenance, replacement and/or refueling based on operational conditions. Objective: ongoing O&M savings and capital efficiency long-term.

3. The ability to maximize participation in utility programs, such as demand response to protect operations against increased grid instability and declining power quality, while supporting the grid’s regional customer base (i.e., your community).

4. An asset portfolio architecture that allows for the integration and secure operation of green energy sources and that scales as these options are available. Objective: a well-balanced portfolio of cost-effective generation sources that closely match site demands.

5. The ability to identify areas of potential electric conservation during peak power consumption periods on the regional grid, shifting load to alleviate potential destabilization of the grid. Objective: managing peak power via a real-time prioritization of on-site “call options.”

6. The ability to recognize stress and/or emergency signals from the grid upstream of your organization to allow for seamless management of grid-related disruptions and maintain high-nines reliability.

Now, let’s say you did the work and created such an operation. What would the benefits be?

First, you’d see a reduction in service interruptions. Second, you’d experience considerable cost savings from lowering your cost of asset ownership and the ability to monetize your power generation.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly as we move into the next generation of sustainability, your status in the community would be one of viable, contributing resource rather than a highly-exposed and potentially risk-generating consumer of energy. In essence, you would be a welcome beacon during these stormy demand times.

Kevin Kushman, CEO
kevin.kushman@bluepillar.com
(888) 234-3212

Blue Pillar’s Digital Energy Network: Lowers Costs, Assures Compliance, Unlocks Energy Value.

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Written by experts, hands-on practitioners and technologists and recognized thought leaders, each week new blog posts will cover impactful, practical information on a variety of important and timely topics including cost control and containment, energy-centric technologies and automation methods, distributed energy management, energy assets, demand response, sustainability, microgrids, SCADA and more.

“We are excited that our industry will have a platform for bi-directional exchanges on a multitude of topics, whether it be how best to lower energy asset ownership or simply provide guidance on how to improve regulatory and environmental compliance. In addition, there seems to be growing interest in increasing levels of infrastructure reliability, business continuity, operational efficiency and cyber-security- all of which are great blog topics for discussion,” said Brad Witter, CTO and Co-Founder.

Visit www.bluepillar.com/blog to be part of the conversation.

About Blue Pillar
Founded in 2006, Blue Pillar enables organizations to consolidate and securely control disparate energy assets through a Digital Energy Network that automates and centralizes command and control over the generation and consumption of power. Blue Pillar’s packaged software solutions help customers rapidly implement a turn-key system that minimizes overall energy spend, streamlines day-to-day energy management operations and helps stabilize the power grid. Blue Pillar is backed by venture capitalists Claremont Creek Ventures, Arsenal Venture Partners, OnPoint Technologies and Allos Ventures.. For more information, visit www.bluepillar.com.

Kevin Kushman,CEO

Often, they’re missing what we consider a key element of sustainability: reliable core systems, including energy systems. I believe we’re starting to see the second wave of sustainability, which is centered around resiliency, long-term ROI, and mission-critical risk mitigation.

For those in charge of critical power systems, that includes being able to securely and reliably expand operations in the face of external factors such as cyber security and physical security incidents, natural disasters, power quality degradation from utilities, and shifting regulations. There are internal factors to consider as well: aging infrastructure, increasing on-site electronic power loads, expanded communication requirements, a need for big data management, and high risk of product loss.

Becoming a “greener” company by running recycling programs and creating environments that use less heating and cooling are important, but they are merely first steps. If your critical operations, such as on-site energy systems, are not secure and reliable, the risks are much more serious than unnecessary spending on air conditioning.

Enterprises like hospitals, data centers, and chip fabricators are well aware of the risks associated with power issues due to weather, utility outages, or security breaches. Other organizations may not be fully aware of potential dangers. High-tech or bio-manufacturing companies risk damage to expensive machinery or batch processed product from power fluctuations, and many college campuses house valuable research in highly-sensitive climates. (Several years ago, more than two years’ worth of research was lost along with 700 research animals due to a power failure at Ohio State University when critical power systems failed to keep up with demand during a heat wave.)

Today, new system resiliency metrics are emerging to demonstrate the direct impact to enterprise financial performance from investments in core operations. They illustrate the value of uptime, secure systems, and efficient asset management, including value optimization through active participation in regional energy markets as a stabilizing asset owner. That’s what we call true sustainability.

Kevin Kushman,CEO
kevin.kushman@bluepillar.com
(888) 234-3212

• by William Pentland
• 2/17/2013 @ 10:12PM.

In 2006, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security‘s Critical Infrastructure Task Force recommended that the objective of critical infrastructure planning be shifted from critical infrastructure “protection” to critical infrastructure “resilience.”

“Protection, in isolation, is a brittle strategy,” the Task Force concluded. “We cannot protect every potential target against every conceivable attack; we will never eliminate all vulnerabilities.”

This paradigm shift has especially important implications for the electric power grid. Simply put, in the context of the electric grid, resilience is not reliability.

Reliability refers to the grid’s ability to provide customers with electricity during normal “blue sky” operations. By contrast, resilience refers to the power grid’s ability to either remain operational during disruptions or “degrade gracefully when it must.” In other words, the electric grid’s resilience is a measure of how well it can absorb the impact of hurricanes, high winds and severe snow storms. By this standard, the electric grid is spectacularly un-resilient in many of parts of the United States.

Many of the mature enterprise energy management solutions available on the market were designed to promote reliability through protection and prevention.

For example, Lockheed Martin’s Enterprise Energy Management called SEEView is tailored to the needs of electric grid operators. Per Lockheed’s SEEView brochure:

SEEview seamlessly integrates EMS, DMS, GIS, OMS, AMI, CIS and other systems to help utilities respond quickly to disruptive conditions such as rapidly rising wholesale market prices, the unexpected lack of renewable energy availability, potential emissions violations or electric vehicle recharging hot spots. The ability to monitor all key enterprise systems from a single browser allows utilities to continuously optimize their generation mix, carbon footprint, customer satisfaction and profitability while complying with a growing mix of emissions, security and renewable energy regulations.

The SEEView platform prevents disruptions to the electric power grid. In other words, it seems more focused on protection than resilience.  In the context of enterprise energy management, resilience solutions are tailored to the needs of the grid’s customers not the grid’s operators.

Blue Pillar, an Indianapolis-based enterprise energy software start up, is a case in point.

Founded in 2006, Blue Pillar has pioneered a “system of subsystems” software platform called the ”Digital Energy Network,” which provides the grid’s customers rather than the grid’s operators with a clutch of command and control capabilities.   The Digital Energy Network allows organizations to manage the full spectrum of distributed generation assets as a fleet, which enhances business continuity, reduces enterprise risk and transforms cost centers into profit centers.

When the grid is up, the Network turns ideal energy assets into revenue-generating assets by managing run-times to reduce peak demand and enabling cost-effective participation in various regulatory and competitive programs and markets – e.g., demand response.    When the grid is down, the Network enhances customers’ ability to ride through temporary power disruptions and prolonged blackouts.

Blue Pillar has deployed its network platform on 50 sites encompassing over 1,050 endpoints, representing over 150 megawatts of capacity in major demand response markets. According to Pike Research, Blue Pillar “is focused first on [immediate ROI] mission-critical healthcare campus infrastructure to capture greater value from existing on-site generation by selling [demand response] services to grid operators and utilities.”

The Center for American Progress (CAP) recently predicted that a constellation of emerging trends would converge around the concept of networked energy and, the process, create a fundamentally new engineering model for managing energy.  In The Networked Energy Web, CAP authors, Bracken Hendricks and Adam James, described these converging trends like so:

Today we stand at the cusp of the next major transformation—one that connects the ongoing technology innovations in telecommunications and information technology with the emergence of intelligent, efficient, and cleaner energy networks. Three core technologies are rapidly converging, unlocking new productivity gains in our energy system that come from modern information technology-enabled networks. First, distributed energy generation is enabling efficient, decentralized energy production close to the point of use by consumers, integrating energy generation more fully into our homes, offices, and factories. Second, this trend coincides with new potential for improved energy efficiency in buildings, which substitutes better use of information for the wasteful use of energy and dramatically reduces the need for electricity production. Finally, both of these changes are being enabled through the integration of smart grid technology in the power transmission and distribution grid, which moves not only electrons but also information effectively through our energy networks.

Like Blue Pillar, PowerSecure, a Wake Forest, NC-based veteran of the energy services industry, is also jockeying for position in the networked energy space.  PowerSecure’s Interactive Distributed Generation platform is custom-engineered to monetize on-site power assets efficiently through proprietary operating algorithms that optimized run times – think peak shaving and demand response capacity products.

Link to the resource

INDIANAPOLIS — November 19, 2012 — Blue Pillar, a leading developer of packaged software solutions that automate the management of distributed energy resources, today announced the introduction of the world’s first Digital Energy Network based on the company’s next-generation packaged solution. As a turn-key “system of subsystems,” a Blue Pillar Digital Energy Network securely consolidates and centralizes the monitoring and management of an organization’s disparate energy assets. This best practices approach enables any organization to lower its total cost of energy asset ownership, improve regulatory and environmental compliance and increase levels of asset reliability, business continuity, operational efficiency and cyber-security.

“The need for a Digital Energy Network exists in virtually any organization looking to enhance revenues from existing legacy power assets,” said Peter Asmus, senior research analyst of energy with Pike Research. “That’s because today’s status quo enterprise energy infrastructures typically lack remote monitoring and control capabilities over critical energy assets, such as diesel generators, automated transfer switches or co-generation systems. The Digital Energy Network concept is bridging this significant gap, setting the stage for growth in distributed energy resource platforms such as microgrids, demand response and virtual power plants.”

In the absence of a Digital Energy Network, organizations have had to contend with the following problems with their backup power systems:

• Service interruptions that disrupt business operations
• Operational inefficiencies due to an absence of centralized asset management
• Unrealized financial returns from new demand response markets
• Regulatory compliance exposure
• Lack of real-time insight into energy asset readiness
• Energy asset security risks

To overcome these challenges, a Blue Pillar Digital Energy Network adds a cyber-secure layer of intelligence to an organization’s energy assets and connects them digitally with full remote command and control capabilities. Each energy asset is networked into a system of subsystems that are monitored and managed centrally in real-time. Blue Pillar’s Digital Energy Network is also designed to interface with other energy management systems, including those for buildings, campuses and/or microgrids. This provides an infrastructure-wide view into the performance of critical energy assets resulting in real-time situational awareness down to the circuit level.

“Deploying Blue Pillar’s Digital Energy Network for Tenet’s energy fleet will help us minimize our overall energy spend, streamline our day-to-day energy management operations and make a meaningful contribution to the stability of the power grid,” said Ken Sutherland, Vice President of Engineering Services, Construction and Design at Tenet Healthcare Corporation. “Blue Pillar’s packaged software solution scales and each campus can be deployed quickly, which gives Tenet a faster path to achieve savings.”

Blue Pillar’s Digital Energy Network

With Blue Pillar’s next-generation energy management system, organizations can perform a wide range of critical functions that include:

• Visualization: real-time monitoring of energy assets from any web-enabled device with live surveillance feeds into individual assets
• Dispatch: Secure, intelligent control of on-site energy capacity based on local load requirements, upstream grid-level instability or economic value
• Testing/Compliance: remote initiation of emergency power supply system tests required by EPA, Joint Commission or corporate regulations. Automated reporting and archival creates operating history by circuit.
• Emergency Management: perform 24/7 monitoring of system status, immediate notification of emergency events, post-emergency analysis
• Real-Time Situational Awareness: determine at-a-glance status of all emergency power assets and quickly troubleshoot individual assets
• Data Logging: support event, historical, archival and testing logs

Blue Pillar’s Digital Energy Network consists of the next-generation Blue Pillar Enterprise Software that runs on a central server or in the cloud, and secure Asset Interface Microservers (AIMs) that connect the energy assets, such as generators, switchgear, automatic transfer switches, fuel systems, cogeneration and chillers.

The system is also comprised of the Blue Pillar Dashboard that provides real-time situational views into the state and readiness of all energy production and consumption equipment across all categories of energy assets. In addition, the system features an Asset Library that creates a digital representation of each energy asset in the Digital Energy Network. This continually expanding library offers the industry’s most comprehensive list of makes, models and vintages of energy assets from hundreds of manufacturers along with detailed wiring diagrams and work instructions to connect to AIMs.

About Blue Pillar

Founded in 2006, Blue Pillar enables organizations to consolidate and control disparate energy assets through a Digital Energy Network that automates and centralizes command and control over the generation and consumption of power. Blue Pillar’s packaged software solutions help customers rapidly implement a turn-key system that minimizes overall energy spend, streamlines day-to-day energy management operations and helps stabilize the power grid. Backed by venture capitalists Claremont Creek Ventures, Arsenal Venture Partners, OnPoint Technologies and Allos Ventures, Blue Pillar is headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana. For more information, visit www.bluepillar.com.

“The concept and real-world implementation of real-time digital energy networks is a potential game-changer,” said Peter Asmus, senior research analyst of energy with Pike Research. “Whether talking about microgrids, DR, or VPPs, the future is bright for smart grid aggregation and optimization structures and programs.”

Blue Pillar’s Digital Energy Network solution is a turn-key “system of subsystems” that securely consolidates and centralizes the monitoring and management of an organization’s disparate energy assets. This best practices approach enables any organization to lower its total cost of energy asset ownership, improve regulatory and environmental compliance and increase levels of asset reliability, business continuity, operational efficiency and cyber-security.

“The advantages of our Digital Energy Network solution provide significant benefits to an organization’s operations, finance and facilities management stakeholders,” said Kevin Kushman, CEO of Blue Pillar. “With a Blue Pillar Digital Energy Network, chief operating officers can improve business continuity, energy security and regulatory and environmental compliance. Chief financial officers can lower their energy spend by monetizing power generation and consumption through simplified participation in ancillary energy markets and demand response programs. And facility managers can enhance staff productivity through substantially simplified operation, maintenance, troubleshooting and testing.”

About Blue Pillar

Founded in 2006, Blue Pillar enables organizations to consolidate and control disparate energy assets through a Digital Energy Network that automates and centralizes command and control over the generation and consumption of power. Blue Pillar’s packaged software solutions help customers rapidly implement a turn-key system that minimizes overall energy spend, streamlines day-to-day energy management operations and helps stabilize the power grid. Backed by venture capitalists Claremont Creek Ventures, Arsenal Venture Partners, OnPoint Technologies and Allos Ventures, Blue Pillar is headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana. For more information, visit www.bluepillar.com.