APRIL 2018CIOAPPLICATIONS.COM9Cloud computing typically costs less than the on-site server-based system required to manage the same amount of processing power and data, and it eliminates on-site servers, storage devices and software applications. Providers fully manage the services, which are licensed on demand per day or per month, giving users as much or as little service as they need. Who is moving applications to the Cloud?As per a recent cloud survey from IDC, 18% of Utilities indicated a propensity to move to a public cloud in 2018.Smaller municipalities and water utilities often own little of their infrastructure, which makes them good candidates for outsourcing their applications to the public cloud. For these smaller public utilities to move to the cloud, they just need to get permission from city hall, while investor owned utilities (IOUs) must get permission from the public utility commission. Meanwhile, many of the larger utilities are making the move to a private cloud to reduce the concerns of running applications in a public cloud.Movement to the cloud seems to be occurring in three utility sub-segments:- Retail only, where customer engagement is delivered in a public cloud around an omni-channel experience along with commodity billing (using interval meters) as well as non-energy billing.- Distribution only, where smart meter and grid data is managed as an energy cloud service with a need for more complex billing (Distribution System Operators and Meter System Operators).- Fully Integrated utilities are mainly moving to a private and/or a hybrid cloud approach where core functions are kept on premise, but edge processes to reduce costs and leverage a more agile environment are moving to a public cloud especially within the retail and distribution operations.How safe is the Cloud?Cyber security is still a major concern when moving into the cloud. But as one Chief Security Officer explained, the inherent SaaS configuration makes it possible to analyze cloud applications and associated data constantly to optimize delivery providing the highest reliability and scalability. This real-time analysis can detect anomalies in application code or related data much quicker than on-premise installations which could have hidden vulnerabilities that go undetected for months or years. What benefits have been realized to date?Retailers are starting to take advantage of public cloud flexibility with advanced customer engagement and self-service apps. The Green Button initiative in California has built an energy cloud to allow consumers to download their data to manage their appliances more efficiently and has encouraged utilities to build applications and make the data anonymous yet available to third parties for research and marketing.Many utilities are already performing advanced visualization to improve customer service so they can see their assets on a map using real-time geospatial solutions in the cloud to see if weather will impact their field assets. Vegetation management can be monitored by satellite images provided by cloud systems and when compared to a digital twin of transmission and distribution lines, smarter vegetation investments can be made at the right time to avoid outages. ConclusionCloud computing was not initially welcomed as warmly as in other industries, but adoption is dramatically increasing as utilities face increasing disruption from companies such as Tesla, Google and Apple. Cloud computing enables the utility to quickly incorporate advanced applications in customer engagement, machine learning, artificial intelligence and in-memory processing to address these new threats as changes to regulations and improvements in cyber security are reducing the barriers once thought too high to overcome. Cloud computing was not initially welcomed as warmly as in other industries, but adoption is dramatically increasing as utilities face increasing disruption from companies such as Tesla, Google and AppleHenry Bailey
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