(From left to right) Christine Villanueva (VisMin Sales Director of SE), Jennifer delos Reyes (Digital Transformation Manager, of AP), Mark Valencia (Chief Technology Officer of AP), Anton Perdices (SVP-Chief Operations Officer Distribution Group of AP), Ireen Catane (Country President of SE), Antoine Thomachot (Digital Grid Sales Head of SE), Nikhil Patki (Head of Business Development of SE) James Lagare (Managing Director Geodata), and Rodson Lumayaga (Vismin Account Manager)/ contributed photo via Wenilyn B. Sabalo
CEBU CITY, Philippines — The country’s leading provider of renewable energy, AboitizPower, has partnered with Schneider Electric, a global specialist in energy management and automation, to improve its operations and increase sustainability through the use of geographical information systems (GIS).
AboitizPower SVP and COO Anton Mari Perdices and Schneider Electric Country President Ireen Catane led the ceremonial signing of a memorandum of agreement on Tuesday, November 29, 2022, to formalize the three-year partnership.
The activity was held at the Aboitiz Gallery in Cebu City.
According to Perdices, Schneider Electric’s GIS system will give AboitizPower a more accurate view of its network. Apart from upgrading its current system, he said, this will also help a lot in automating its workflow.
“Odette still rings in everybody’s ear, right? So we’ll know exactly which transformers we have, where they are, where the poles are, down to the distribution meter. So, by that, especially in times for restoration, we can already start plotting how we are going to handle the restoration, based on looking at the geographic interface and targeting the different areas, so we can get a quick view of what’s energized and what’s not energized,” he said.
“It is a big help to get an up-to-date real-time view of what assets we have to monitor and control,” he added.
GIS, a location-based system which creates, manages, analyzes, and maps data, is useful in emergency situations like natural calamities, where people need power restored quickly.
GIS collects data to a map, integrating location data with descriptive information, ultimately providing a foundation for mapping and analysis that is used across industries. It also plays a major role in determining the most ideal locations for identifying and developing renewable energy resources.
Schneider Electric’s GIS System of Design Solution Suite called ArcFM promises a comprehensive enterprise digital mapping solution that provides a map-centric, intuitive way to model, design, maintain, and manage facility and land-based information.
It is also used by utilities to digitally transform the life cycle assets and recreate a digital twin of the distribution networks using ESRI’s ArcGIS technology.
AboitizPower’s plans is to enhance its current GIS system by integrating Schneider Electric’s ArcFM Solution XI Series, enabling AboitizPower to deliver increased efficiency, powerful data sharing, and data accuracy in the work environment.
The ceremonial signing on Tuesday kicked off the three-year partnership, with the first implementation for Visayan Electric Co., an AboitizPower subsidiary, scheduled to be completed by 2024.
The partnership also enables AboitizPower to extend the GIS and ArcFM platform to its subsidiaries in the coming years.
Perdices said this is just the start of its partnership with Schneider Electric, as the latter will also help them toward a full Advanced Distribution Management System (ADMS) solution.
“This is just one of the first steps. I’ve seen previous GIS systems, and it was really cool, how you could see all our assets on top of a map. We’re hoping that we have a very mutual, beneficial relationship going forward. To me, what’s most important is not just the capability of the product, but the actual support team that comes along with that product,” he said.
Schneider Electric is a 186-year-old Fortune 500 company with a presence globally. The Philippines is part of its China East Asia operations. With a report from a press release
/bmjo
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