San Francisco, CA, November 14 – DevonWay, a leading provider of Continuous Improvement software to the Utilities industry, this week announced support for North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) PRC-004-4. The standard, which went into effect on July 1, 2016, improves the reliability of power grids by providing a framework for identifying and correcting protection system misoperations, a verified cause of multiple significant outage events.
Protection systems are vital to the overall health of the bulk power grid because they automatically isolate failed parts of the network. When they don’t operate correctly, whether due to incorrect settings or improper maintenance, they contribute to the propagation of the failure and initiate outage events.
“The dependability of our power grid is hugely important to society, not just from an economic standpoint but from a safety standpoint as well,” said Chris Moustakas, DevonWay’s CEO. “We’re delighted to play a part, even if only a small one, to help keep the lights on in homes and hospitals.”
NERC PRC-004-4 obliges transmission owners, generator owners, and distribution providers to have dated evidence of properly identifying and correcting misoperations of protection systems. “By automating the process of creating, routing, and resolving corrective actions, the DevonWay CI Suite has helped the operations of some of the highest reliability organizations in the country, including nuclear generating stations,” continued Moustakas. “And when it comes to reliability, it doesn’t get more serious than at a nuclear power plant, so when we saw this standard come into effect, we knew we could help.”
In parallel to this publication, NERC is developing standards for gathering protection system data across the network, so it can develop meaningful metrics and identify opportunities for further improvements by looking at events on a more macro scale. Although these data reporting requirements are not a part of NERC PRC-004-4, there is little doubt that they will shape further refinements to the standard.
“NERC PRC-004-4 is a great step forward, but it’s not the last one,” said Matt Sacks, DevonWay’s VP of Sales. “As the standard evolves to address misoperations with Special Protection Systems and Remedial Action Schemes, as well as require collecting different types of data, the tailorability of our software ensures our customers can seamlessly incorporate the new rules into their implementation.”
In addition to an intuitive web interface, the DevonWay CI Suite includes the ability to capture information on mobile devices while offline, which is an advantage in rural areas with little or no wireless coverage. The software is available in either a Cloud or on-premise environment, and typical implementations range from 30-90 days, depending on complexity.
About DevonWay
Founded in San Francisco in 2005, DevonWay is a leading provider of Continuous Improvement and Digital Operations applications to customers across industries as diverse as Energy Generation, Government, and Construction. By combining flexibility with enterprise-quality software practices, DevonWay helps high-reliability organizations transform, digitize, and continuously improve their operations.
Contact:
DevonWay
Matt Sacks, 415-904-4000
sales@devonway.com
devonway.com
