Landis+Gyr has increased support for public power load management programs with the release of Power Center 4.6, which provides multitenancy capabilities allowing group management of load control switches and devices.
The multitenancy feature is particularly useful for generation and transmission cooperatives that supply power and transmission services to multiple distribution cooperatives. Northwest Iowa Power Cooperative (NIPCO), which provides reliable wholesale energy and electric transmission services for six rural electric cooperatives and an association of six municipal utilities in Iowa, will begin deployment of Landis+Gyr's advanced load management solution. It will use the multitenancy function of Power Center to control as many as 12,000 switches at member utilities in the initial phase of the project.
Using Landis+Gyr's Gridstream AMI RF mesh communications platform, Power Center directs two-way management and control of intelligent devices, such as load control switches and smart thermostats to verify demand reduction during control events to balance system capacity and power costs. The new multitenancy feature allows Power Center to interact with multiple installations of Command Center, Landis+Gyr's network operating software, so that schedules and commands impacting devices at many utilities can be executed securely and cost-effectively from a single control point.
"The multitenancy feature is broadly applicable for cooperative utilities because it allows sharing of operating costs for load management programs," said Andy Marshall, practice director for Distributed Energy Resource Management at Landis+Gyr. "Power Center continues to deliver features beyond traditional demand response software that enable a virtual power plant approach to load management."
Landis+Gyr's advanced load management solution is an integral part of its connected platform of intelligent devices and software applications for utility IoT networks, and works with other solutions to improve efficiency, protect distribution assets and reduce costs.
