Public Power - November 2008 - (Page 22)

Jackson’s GIS Search A legacy system, falling into disuse, had to be overhauled or replaced. Jackson Energy opted for the latter. When theTennesseeEnergy Jackson Authority in determined it needed more performance and lower cost of ownership from its geographic information system, we asked a lot of questions of ourselves, of product vendors, and of vendors’ references. Jackson Energy employees representing various departments evaluated product offerings for functionality, open architecture, and reduced cost of ownership. The GIS project team observed not only benchmark product demonstrations and collected estimated product implementation costs but also carefully checked user references and observed on-the-job performance at reference sites. It took us the better part of a year and multiple site visits, but by intensely vetting candidate products and companies, we are satisfied we found a replacement GIS that could be supported by internal resources – and, therefore, mitigate the ongoing cost of maintaining the legacy GIS software. We also looked for a unified system that could be used across our electric, gas, water, wastewater, and telecommunications services; for a system with distributed data maintained by and integrated with daily workflow processes; and one that allowed seamless integration to other systems. We are confident the process led us to a GIS that satisfies these requirements and will help us meet our goal of enhanced productivity at a controlled cost. Community-owned Jackson Energy Authority provides multiple services over an area of 335.28 square miles in Madison County, Tenn., serving 33,763 electric, 29,346 natural gas, 3,100 propane, 35,516 water, 27,525 wastewater, and 15,000 telecommunications customers. In the late 1990s, JEA implemented a geographic information system that used a proprietary programming language and a proprietary database. Any customization required us to seek assistance from the vendor’s product help desk/support Web site. We found personnel who support so many systems throughout the market were not 22 NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2008 BY TERESA IRVINE AND JON TAYLOR chitecture desired to reduce ownership costs, or find another GIS. We decided to move to a new system. The next challenge entailed choosing the system that would bring us the improvements we need. We assembled a cross-departmental group to address the GIS needs across the five utilities, evaluate the options, and identify and implement the solution that would best serve every functional group as well as each utility. The GIS project team’s goal was to amass a thorough understanding of user expectations before beginning the project and to optimize communication with users to manage those expectations. However, the team realized, considering the user base and diversity of needs at Jackson Energy, not all potential uses for the new system could be identified before the project began or even realized at project completion. The eight-member GIS project team represented the Engineering, Information Technology, Business Analysis, Customer Service, and Operations departments. Team members were subject matter experts and knew the legacy GIS and its pain points in their respective areas. At the start, each team member went to his/her respective user base to identify requirements, knowledgeable about local configuration issues and we became increasingly less inclined to use this avenue for problem resolution. This diminished the usefulness of the tool and the utility’s productivity. For customization, we considered direct hire of a programmer particularly skilled in the proprietary programming language and developer’s tool kit. Such an internal resource needed to be effective in both utility GIS customization and support of our SCADA (supervisory control and data acquisition) systems, in addition to our enterprise resource planning and customer information system – a rare skill set. Alternatively, we retained a consultant to provide the proprietary programming knowledge we needed. However, our purchased, customized tools for geospatial analysis often did not meet our broad, multi-utility needs. In all approaches, the value of the budget dollars spent maintaining this GIS was relatively low. Further, Jackson Energy Authority wanted a geographic information system that used a multipurpose database architecture, one that held the spatial components used by several core, networked mapping tools – a “one database serving all applications” approach. Finally, JEA wanted to take advantage of the open technology now Jackson Energy Authority wanted a “one database serving all applications” approach. prevalent in the GIS market, giving us more choices in the future. We wanted to be able to customize our interface with applications written to lie on top of the core mapping functionality and prepared with commonly used development tools – either in-house or COTS (common off the shelf) – to extend functionality and maximize our GIS investment. We had two alternatives: Upgrade the legacy system when it offered the open aremphasizing to all managers that their input was vital to assure an across-the-board solution. The team assembled a “SWOT” matrix identifying the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats related to GIS migration. After analysis, it was apparent that the new features and functionality gained would outweigh the capital expenditure involved. Even when we coupled the cost with the risks of change that would imPUBLIC POWER

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Public Power - November 2008

Public Power - November 2008 Contents Perspective 10 Questions Capturing Knowledge Before It Retires Jackson’s GIS Search Keeping a Job Journal Japan Tackles the Kyoto Protocol Getting to 20 by 10 Damless Hydro Power Earthquake: The Hidden Disaster For Engineers Safety For Governing Boards DEED Hometown Connections Parting Shot

Public Power - November 2008

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