PPL Electric Utilities Wins 2022 Achievement Awards from Association of Edison Illuminating Companies

The Association of Edison Illuminating Companies announced today that PPL Electric Utilities has received two of the Association’s 2022 Achievement Awards.

ALLENTOWN, PA, UNITED STATES, October 3, 2022 /EINPresswire.com/ -- The Association of Edison Illuminating Companies (AEIC), the electric utility industry’s longest-serving and preeminent association of leading operations experts, announced today that PPL Electric Utilities has received two of the Association’s prestigious 2022 Achievement Awards.

The AEIC Achievement Awards are presented annually to AEIC member companies, committees, or subcommittees who have clearly demonstrated significant contributions to advancing operational excellence in the electric utility industry.

PPL Electric Utilities has received the AEIC President’s Award, the organization’s highest achievement recognition, for implementing a technological leap in wood pole inspection. After a series of serious incidents exposed the inadequacies of traditional pole inspection methods, PPL Electric Utilities realized a change was needed.

The company sought to eliminate the human interpretation of pole strength and level of decay and ensure accurate and repeatable inspection methodology. Using resistance drill-based wood pole inspection technology, PPL EU ran three pilot programs to map the extent of the condition for external decay, then develop and test a new drill bit design along with software improvements to automatically calculate the exterior decay and the interior decay. The novel resistance drill-based inspection, which is unique to PPL, has improved detection of pole failures and decay, and reduced inspection cost and duration.

What used to take a five-person crew a week to complete (150 pole inspections) can now be accomplished in just two days with a two-man crew. This increased inspection efficiency allows PPL EU to be nimbler and more responsive to emergent issues and to achieve yearly inspection goals faster, more accurately and at a lower cost.

PPL Electric Utilities second 2022 AEIC Achievement Award for its Distribution Protection Analysis Toolkit (DPAT). In partnership with the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), PPL Electric Utilities has positioned itself for the next evolution in power system analysis by developing DPAT, a custom tool designed to further push the boundaries of power engineering software, and a significant first step toward automation of distribution protection settings and analysis.

“AEIC is proud to recognize PPL Electric Utilities, with two awards this year for projects that significantly improve utility operations in key areas,” said Steve Hauser, CEO, AEIC. Their unique approach to pole inspection leadership and innovation in power system analysis is improving operational efficiency exponentially.”

DPAT allows PPL to automate the checking of protection settings as the grid is reconfigured. This eliminates the need for engineers or technicians to undertake the time-consuming process of doing these checks manually and allows them to instead focus on continuous system improvements. DPAT has shown to reduce protection errors and improve setting quality and efficiency, ultimately improving reliability for the utility’s 1.4 million customers by creating an automated, recurring process that continually checks distribution protection settings for errors and recommends improvements when errors are found.

“Becoming one of the top utilities in the country doesn’t happen overnight,” said PPL Electric Utilities President Steph Raymond. “It takes innovation and a questioning mindset. That’s what allows us to continue to find new ways of doing things and breakthroughs in processes in non-traditional places. These awards are perfect examples of our continuous drive to innovate on behalf of our customers.”

PPL Electric Utilities will be presented with the awards on Thursday, October 6th at the 2022 AEIC Annual Meeting in Scottsdale, Arizona. To see a full list of 2022 AEIC Achievement Award recipients, visit
https://aeic.org/achievement-awards/.

About AEIC
AEIC brings together the electric utility industry’s leading operations experts to respond to challenges, accelerate change, and achieve excellence in all aspects of generation, transmission, distribution, and storage of electric power for the benefit of all members, the industry at large, and consumers.

Founded by Thomas Edison and his associates in 1885, AEIC is the electric utility industry’s longest-serving and preeminent association. Today, AEIC’s members work closely together to share knowledge and provide guidance to the industry essential to achieving a modernized grid that delivers a secure energy future for all. To learn more about AEIC, its technical committees, and member companies, visit https://aeic.org/.

Kevin Gould
Stryker-Munley Group on behalf of AEIC
+1 774-545-5142
kgould@strykermunleygroup.com