Beyond POTS [electricity generation/selling control]

Cal ISO was tasked with the responsibility of controlling the generation and sale of electricity to customers in California so that competition would be fostered and customers would get a reliable supply of power at the lowest possible cost. To achieve this result, Cal ISO must oversee the network of generators who elect to "bid" on the supply of electricity, must have real-time access to measurements and status from around the grid, and must be able to do direct AGC on the participating generators. The project with Hathaway entailed the supply of a system, which provided for this real-time access and control in a secure and reliable manner. We provided the hardware to allow for communication over the privately owned ECN (Energy Communication Network). This is a private WAN, owned and operated by MCI with the following capabilities: uses dedicated and shared facilities; delivers SONET to both control sites; delivers T1 (dual) to all generator sites; digital ATM network; carries voice/FAX via VoIP technology; centrally administered; multiple TCP/IP traffic flows; fault tolerant; and high performance. This approach differs from traditional methods used for EMS control systems. The restrictions of the local telephone company\´s hardware are no longer issues. We capitalized on the high speed and high bandwidth provided by the Ethernet connections and the ECN structure