Between the Poles

Be Inspired Awards 2016: 3D design helps 1.8 GW hydro project generate power 10 months ahead of schedule

At the Year in Infrastructure 2016 conference in London, the Be Inspired Awards attracted over 300 submissions.  Many of these were impressive in how they applied digital technology to designing, constructing and maintaining buildings and infrastructure. The winner of this year's Power Generation sector award was a remarkable full-lifecycle BIM project for a hydropower projects in a remote part of Yunnan, China.

Longkaikou hydro-power station is located in Heqing County, Dali Autonomous Prefecture, Yunnan Province.  The primary focus of the project is generating electricity, but it also supports irrigation, water supply and flood control. The dam is a concrete gravity dam.  There are five turbine-generator units with a total installed capacity a 1,800MW.  Construction began in 2007 and in 2012 the reservoir began to fill.  By January 2014, all power generation units were fully operational.

The Longkaikou hydropower station is the first hydropower station in China that fully employed 3D digital design technology from the start of the project. Design of the power plant began in 2005.  More than 20 different disciplines were involved including geology, hydraulic, plant, water diversion, construction, road & bridge, metal structure, hydro-machinery, electrical, HVAC, and drainage.

PowerChina Huadong Engineering Corporation  (Huadong Institute) was responsible for design of the project.  It was the first institute in China's hydropower industry who migrated from traditional 2D CAD design to 3D collaborative design.  The project employed digital model throughout the lifecycle.  The project survey, design, construction and operation are all digital.  This is considered a revolutionary technical innovation in the Chinese hydropower industry.

3D digital design greartly improved the efficiency of the design process by enabling collaborative design.  Clashes between designs from different design teams were greatly reduced and product quality was significantly improved.  For example, equipment clashes were reduced by 95%.  The amount of on-site design change was reduced by over 80%. In the design of some equipment systems and the preparation of drawings, design time reduced by more than 50%.

The efficiency of collaboration between disciplines was significantly improved.  Being able to view designs from different design teams in one unified model greatly reduces the time for review and signoff. In the past, it usually took more than one month to review and signoff a power plant's layout drawings.  With 3D modeling, collaboration between disciplines improved design efficiency by over 40%.

The digital design platform made it possible to assess alternative design scenarios in order optimize designs. It is estimated that optimization of the dam's foundation surface construction based on a 3D geological model saved about CNY 194 million in engineering costs. The dam's foundation's is unique and complex and required innovative engineering because there was no previous model to follow. Using a 3D model of the geology (digital terrain model) made it possible to design and compare alternative construction scenarios to optimize the design. As a result of design optimization, the project was completed about 10 months ahead of schedule, creating economic benefits of up to CNY 1.79 billion.

With the use of 3D digital design and geo-coordination, the Longkaikou Hydropower Station project not only enjoyed a shortened design cycle, improved project and service quality, and reduced construction costs, but also provided the basis for digital operation and maintenance of the facility by the owner. Geo-coordination, a term minted by Bentley, is key to integrating data from many different sources including reality modeling, 3D building models and associated information.  Bentley recognized the value of geo-coordination very early on. With all Bentley applications in the last 12 years every infrastructure asset has geo-coordination in the form of real world x y z coordinates. It is recognized as essential for full-lifecycle (design, build, maintain and operate) BIM.  In this project it was fundamental not only for integrating the dam and hydropower plant design and the digital terrain model, but also for making it possible to reuse the BIM model and associated data during operation and maintenance.

The design was praised by both the construction contractor and the owner.  It enhanced the core competitiveness and reputuation of the Huadong Institute, establishing a strong foundation for winning future hydropower projects.

Be Inspired Awards 2016: Full lifecyle digital modeling of a substation in a congested urban area

At the Year in Infrastructure 2016 conference in London, the Be Inspired Awards attracted over 300 submissions.  Many of these were impressive in how they applied digital technology to designing, constructing and maintaining buildings and infrastructure. The winner of this year's Utilities and Communications sector award was a remarkable full-lifecycle BIM project for a new substation in downtown Wuhan, a major city in central China.

The Miaoshan 220kV Secondary Transformer Substation is a newly built large indoor substation in Dongxihu District, Wuhan City, Hubei Province. The project integrated digital tools for construction, site preparation, mechanical, electrical, and protection.  The 3D digital modeling approach enabled collaborative design of an indoor substation with restricted space with multiple voltages in a very congested urban area with minimal impact on the existing buildings and infrastructure and all of this within a tight timeframe.

The project faced severe challenges.  Firstly, it was located in a congested area of downtown Wuhan and the substation was required to be very compact to minimize its impact on the surrounding buildings and infrastructure.  Reality modeling the existing environment was essential because nearby buildings had to be taken into account in designing the site layout including feeder cables.  Secondly, the substation is an indoor station, composed of a building complex with two floors above ground and and one basement floor.  Because of the severely restricted space there was a high risk of clashes in a multi-discipline design environment, easily leading to problems of different teams placing equipment in the same space.  Thirdly, the substation was intended to handle multiple voltages including 220kV, 110kV, and 10kV cables.  Each voltage was handled by a different design team.  Because many cables had to be routed into and out of the building in very restricted space, the risk of collisions and intersections among power control cables of different classes of voltage was high.

3D modeling was essential for this project.  Because of the high risk of clashes and collisions between the designs from different design teams, a shared 3D model was essential to ensure a collaborative approach to design.  The project used several different digital tools for different aspects of the project across disciplines, including electrical, construction, structure, general drawing, irrigation works, heating, ventilation, and site preparation. The electrical team used a substation design tool to perform the design of main wiring, electrical equipment layout, stress calculation and arrangement of wires, lightning protection and grounding, lighting and the layout of cables and supports. The construction team uses a building design tool to design walls, doors, windows, stairs, roof and louvers. The structure team used building design and structural engineering tools to design floors and columns. The master plan team used building design and site preparation tools to design the gate, enclosure walls, access road and the building site. Irrigation work, heating and ventilation programs used a digital building performance tool to complete air conditioner, axial flow fan, water and wastewater pipes
designs.

The digital modeling approach made it possible for people from different disciplines to work in a  collaborative design environment within a unified model space, which greatly reduced clashes between different designs.  One of the important benefits of the 3D model approach was that minimized the impact of the substation on the existing infrastructure.   Since the transformer substation is located in the downtown of Wuhan where buildings are dense, reality capture was used to model the area surrounding the substation.  This helped to ensure the substation site design did not conflict with surrounding buildings.  A major benefit of the 3D model approach was that it made it possible to design a substation that fulfilled the requirements, but avoided having to demolish four nearby residential apartment buildings.  To enable combining the model, the point cloud data, the digital terrain model and other external data everything was geolocated (geo-coordinated).

Geo-coordination, a term minted by Bentley, is key to integrating data from many different sources including reality modeling, 3D building models and associated information.  Bentley recognized the value of geo-coordination very early on. With all Bentley applications in the last 12 years every infrastructure asset has geo-coordination in the form of real world x y z coordinates.  Geo-coordination enables engineers and facilities managers to find things that are tagged,related, or close to a building element and it makes it possible to navigate the information environment, not only 3D design models (virtual reality), but also 3D models in a real world context (augmented reality). It is recognized as essential for full-lifecycle (design, build, maintain and operate) BIM.  In this project it was fundamental not only for integrating the substation design and its real world context, but also for making it possible to reuse the BIM model and associated data during operation and maintenance.

The digital design approach reduced the project design time by 20 working days, verification time by 30 working days, and saved about CNY 50 thousand in design costs.  According to project statistics, the collaborative approach enabled by digital modeling avoided more than ten potential cases of rework during construction, saving CNY 2 million.  During the project review by external evaluators, the 3D digital model made it easier for the evaluators to understand the design intent, which played a decisive role in ensuring adequate communication of the design and implementation. This reduced the number of meetings required during the review.  A side effect was that it enhanced the reputation of the Design Institute.

During construction, mobile devices were used in the field to convey details of cable placement to the construction unit.  In addition, models showing the intended location of cables were converted into 3D PDF documents which were used in the field to ensure that the construction unit understood the designed cable placement.  The result was that construction went smoothly, reducing construction time by 15 days.

Some of the key benefits were that reality modeling of the neighborhood enabled planning of the station site layout as well as site access that minimized impact on the surrounding buildings.  The project uses 3D digital model and associated software made it possible for all disciplines to work collaboratively which significantly reduced the clashes between designs form different disciplines. 3D modeling made it possible to plan the arrangement of various types of cables a a very detailed level, which helped avoid crossovers and collisions and reducing fire risk and enhancing safety. 

Perhaps most importantly for the total cost of the project including operations and maintenance, the model and associated data was brought into an FM tool that made it possible efficiently manage plant data, technical specifications, operation and maintenance manuals and other detailed information for operation and maintenance management of the substation after construction.

Geospatial and BIM will be key to transforming construction

In a recent report, Imagining construction’s digital future, McKinsey & Company suggests that the construction industry is ripe for disruption and two of the technologies that it believes will be key in that anticipated transformation are goespatial and BIM.  

The McKinsey report presents data that shows that large construction projects typically take 20 percent longer to finish than scheduled and are up to 80 percent over budget. Construction productivity has actually declined in some markets since the 1990s and financial returns for contractors are relatively low and volatile.

The report finds that construction has been slow to adopt process and technological innovations. R&D spending in construction lags other industries.  Construction R&D  is less than 1% of total industry revenue compared to 3.5-4.5 % in the auto and aerospace sectors.  And construction spending on IT is low compared to other industries.

The McKinsey Global Institute estimates that the world will need to spend $57 trillion on infrastructure through 2030 to keep up with global GDP growth. This is a massive incentive for the  construction industry to transform productivity and project delivery through new technologies and improved practices.

McKinsey has identified five technologies that it believes will be transformative in the construction industry.  Th first two are geospatial technologies and BIM.

Disruptive technologies: Geospatial and BIM

Geospatial

About 4 million excavations are carried out on the UK road network each year to install or repair buried utility pipes and cables. Not knowing the location of buried assets causes practical problems that increase costs and delay projects, but more importantly, it increases the risk of injury for utility owners, contractors and road users. The problems associated with inaccurate location of buried pipes and cables are serious and are rapidly worsening due to the increasing density of underground infrastructure in major urban areas.  In the U.S. it is estimated that an underground utility is hit every minute.  Underground utility conflicts and relocations are the number one cause of project delays during road construction.

These type of unforeseen problems are a major reason that projects are delayed and go over budget. Discrepancies between ground conditions and early survey estimates can require costly last-minute changes to project scope and design. New techniques that integrate high-definition photography, 3-D laser scanning, ground penetrating radar in conjunction with other technologies and geographic information systems make it possible to reduce the risk of hitting underground utilities.

Reality modeling using phodar and LiDAR technologies provides high-quality 3-D images and point clouds that can be integrated with building information modeling (BIM).  Used in conjunction with ground-penetrating radar, magnetometers, and other equipment, LiDAR can generate above-ground and underground 3-D images of project sites.  A vendor has recently offered an above ground LiDAR scanner combined with a ground penetrating radar array that can scan above and below ground at up to 15 km per hour.  This is particularly important in congested urban or  environmentally sensitive sites where disturbance needs to be minimized.

These advanced survey techniques are complemented by geographic information systems that allow maps, images, distance measurements, and GPS positions to be overlaid. This information can then be uploaded to other analytical and visualization systems for use in project planning and construction.

Modern survey technology is more accessible than ever because costs have come down substantially. An light-weight imaging laser scanner with software that runs on an iPad has been introduced at a breakthrough price if $16,000.  Light-weight and low cost high-resolution cameras and laser scanners can be mounted on standard industrial drones. Specialized technology providers offer cost-efficient survey packages, including drone and UAV equipment, data uploading, and processing services, as well as software to manage drone flights, data capture, and dashboards to visualize information.

BIM

The construction industry has yet to adopt an integrated platform that spans project planning, design, construction, operations, and maintenance. The industry still relies on bespoke point solutions.  Designers, contractors, and operators use different software that do not sync with one another.  There is no single source that provides an integrated, real-time, full-lifecycle view of project design, cost, and schedule.

McKinsey reports a study found that 75 % of those that adopted BIM reported a positive return on their investment. They also reported shorter project life cycles and savings on paperwork and material costs.  A number of governments, including those in Britain, Finland, and Singapore, and in the future probably France and Russia mandate the use of BIM for public infrastructure projects.

McKinsey believes the future lies in 5-D BIM, which is a five-dimensional representation that includes a project’s cost and schedule in addition to the spatial design in 3-D. It also includes such details such as geometry, specifications, aesthetics, thermal, and acoustic properties. A 5-D BIM platform allows designers, owners and contractors to collaborate on a project.  The visual and intuitive nature of 5-D BIM gives contractors a better chance to identify risks earlier and thus to make better decisions.  McKinsey argues that to get the full benefit of BIM technology, project owners and contractors need to incorporate its use right from the design stage, and all stakeholders need to adopt standardized design and data-reporting formats compatible with BIM. In addition, owners and contractors need to dedicate resources for BIM implementation and invest in capability building.  When combined with reality modeling and geolocation, 5-D BIM technology offers a way of providing the full-lifecycle BIM modeling that the British government expects will contribute to reducing public infrastructure costs over the lifetime of a facility by 40% or more.

Leica lowers the bar with a $16k imaging laser scanner

Leica Geosystems has announced the “BLK360,” a miniaturized 3D imaging laser scanner. The BLK360 captures full-color panoramic images overlaid on a high accuracy point cloud. The one-button Leica BLK360 and included Autodesk software is intended to be easy to operate so that anyone who can operate an iPad can use the imaging laser scanner.  It is incredibly small - it weighs only about a kilogram.

It collects 360,000 points per second and has a range of 60 meters with 4 mm accuracy.  In addition to a LiDAR sensor, the BLK360 includes infrared sensors for thermal imaging and 360° cameras.  It is completely wireless and streams image and point cloud data to an iPad. A complete 360° laser scan with panoramic image capture and transfer to the iPad Pro requires 3 minutes. 

With an anticipated retail price of the scanner and software is $15,990/€15,000, this really lowers the entry barrier to laser scanning.

Earth observation satellite Worldview-4 with a resolution of 30 cm launched

After a long delay Worldview-4 has been launched.  This means that now the DigitalGlobe constellation of satellites can photograph any spot on Earth more than 4 times per day at a resolution of 30 cm (panchromatic) or 120 cm (multi-spectral which include near infrared) and with a locational accuracy of 3 meters.  Worldview-4's orbit is 617 km above the Earth.  It has an average revisit time of less than a day and can capture 680,000 square km, which is 70 terabytes of imagery per day.  (The Earth's surface area is 510 million square kilometers.)

This augments the16 years or 80 petabytes of Earth-observation imagery that DigitalGlobe holds in its library. 

Digital Globe has put all of the data on the public cloud (Amazon) and has provided a platform that supports efficient search, processing and workflows. GBDX is an online environment for efficiently running advanced algorithms for information extraction from imagery datasets at scale.  It is a set of RESTful APIs, and algorithms that have already been implemented by Digital Globe or its partners include car counting, orthorectification, land use, land cover, and atmospheric compensation.  One of the most important efficiencies of the GBDX architecture is that it avoids having to move huge volumes of data over the internet.  It does this by bringing the application to the data, rather than the data to the application. 

IEA World Energy Outlook projects world warming greater than 2° C based on COP21 committments

The International Energy Agency (IEA) has issued its annual World Energy Outlook 2016.  The IEA has examined several scenarios. All the Paris COP21 climate pledges from 190 countries have been incorporated into its main scenario.  (It does not include any assessment of what the Trump administration may do with respect to the COP21 committments made by the world's second largest emitter.) It has projected that this scenario will actually result in 2.7 °C of warming.  A scenario, called the 450 Scenario, with a 50% probability of limiting global warming to 2 ° C was also examined.

In its main scenario which includes emission reductions from COP21 pledges, the IEA projects a 30% rise in global energy demand to 2040.  In 2040 it is projected that 60% of all new power generation capacity will come from renewables.  In 2040 renewables are projected to represent 37% of all power generation.  By 2040 most renewables-based generation is projected to be competitive without subsidies. Solar PV is expected to see a further 40-70% reduction in cost by 2040 and onshore wind by an additional 10-25%. However, fossil fuel generation continues to be important. Natural gas consumption is projected to rise by 50%.  Growth in coal use essentially stops while growth in nuclearpower is limited to China.

Energy-related CO2 emissions plateaued in 2015 mainly because of a 1.8% improvement in the energy intensity of the global economy.   This is partly because a growing proportion of the $1.8 trillion currently invested in energy annually is directed to renewables.  But the IEA projects that even with the COP21 commitments energy-related emissions will continue to grow by 0.5% per year.

It is projected that a cumulative $44 trillion in investment will be needed in the global energy supply over the next 15 years.  60% of this will go to oil, gas and coal extraction and supply, including power plants using these fuels, and nearly 20% to renewable energies. Another $23 trillion will be required for energy efficiency improvements.   For comparison over the last 15 years, 70% of total energy supply investment went to fossil fuels.   This scenario requires a significant reallocation of capital from fossil fuels to renewables. This is aided by dropping fossil fuel subsidies.  In 2015 the value of fossil-fuel consumption subsidies dropped to $325 billion, down from $500 billion the previous year.

The IEA projects that the COP21 commitments will slow the projected rise in global energy-related CO2 emissions.  However, it does not believe that this is enough to limit warming to less than 2 °C.  The IEA's 450 Scenario, which is based on a 50 % probability of limiting warming to under 2 °C, requires a further major reallocation of investment capital going to the energy sector. A greater proportion of the $40 trillion in cumulative energy supply investment has to move from fossil fuels and towards renewables and other low carbon investments in nuclear and carbon capture and storage so that the share going to fossil fuels would drop to about a third. In addition, $35 trillion is needed for improvements in energy efficiency - that's $12 trillion more compared with the main scenario. The 450 Scenario implies that before the end of this century, the energy sector must become carbon-neutral.  That means all residual emissions from fuel combustion are either captured and stored, or offset by technologies that remove carbon from the atmosphere.

Low carbon climate-resilient infrastructure requires private funding

A Report by the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate has recommended that since more than 60% of the world’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are sourced from the world's existing stock of infrastructure, ensuring infrastructure is built to deliver sustainability is the only way to meet the COP21 goal  of keeping warming below 2°C and to guarantee long-term, inclusive and resilient growth. Infrastructure underpins core economic activity and is an essential foundation for achieving inclusive sustainable growth.  Investing in sustainable infrastructure is key for reigniting global growth and reducing climate risk.

The Global Commission is chaired by former President of Mexico Felipe Calderón and co-chaired by the climate economist Lord Nicholas Stern.

The report estimates that $90 trillion in sustainable infrastructure investment will be required over the next 15 years.  It stresses that this will require a shift in the world's construction and financial sectors to ensure that this money, which will be increasingly private, is spent on low-carbon, energy-efficient projects. 

Change in infrastructure spending required for a 2°C scenario (percentage change in expenditure over 2015-2030 compared to Business-as-usual)

The report has adopted a broad definition of infrastructure which includes both traditional types of infrastructure; energy, public transport, buildings, water supply, and sanitation and also natural infrastructure; forest landscapes, wetlands and watershed protection.  Infrastructure underpins core economic activity and is an essential foundation for achieving inclusive sustainable growth. It is indispensable for development and poverty elimination, as it enhances access to basic services, education and work opportunities, and can boost human capital and quality of life.

Investment is needed to replace ageing infrastructure in advanced economies and to accommodate higher growth and structural change in emerging market and developing countries. This will require a significant increase globally, from the estimated US$3.4 trillion per year currently invested in infrastructure to about US$6 trillion per year. The Global Commission found that it does not need to cost much more to ensure that this new infrastructure is compatible with climate goals, and the additional up-front costs can be fully offset by efficiency gains and fuel savings over the infrastructure lifecycle.

Importance of private infrastructure financing

Transforming the financial system and its intermediaries is essential to scaling up sustainable infrastructure finance.  Public finance and investment will continue to play a critical role, particularly in low-income countries.  But large amounts of private capital are needed and this will only flow if the right market signals are present within the financial system. The report suggests that reforms are needed in the financial regulatory system as well as other policy reforms, specifically, to price carbon to level the playing field between sustainable and unsustainable options in order to encourage private investment in sustainable infrastructure.

Private investment requires financial returns.  Efficiency in construction and operation and maintenance of infrastructure is essential. Increasing productivity drives technological innovation. Many governments as well as private sector engineering and construction firms have identified building information modeling (BIM) as a key foundation for increasing construction productivity.  Owners are beginning to recognize the benefits of full lifecycle BIM especially when augmented by geospatial technology.

Energy

The report estimates that energy infrastructure will require investment of US$25 trillion, or nearly a third of total core infrastructure investment over the coming 15 years. In addition energy efficiency will require investment of about the same magnitude.  Building sustainable energy infrastructure encourages economic growth, reduces air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions, and plays a key role in building resilience.

Energy efficiency

The report found that energy efficiency is a highly cost-effective way to manage demand and reduce the investment requirements for overall energy supply. Increasing energy efficiency in industry, buildings and transport could achieve up to half of the emission reductions needed globally to peak greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 according to the IEA.  Energy efficiency investments in IEA member countries since 1990 have avoided US$5.7 trillion of energy expenditure.  The IEA estimates further investments could boost global GDP by US$18 trillion by 2035, increasing growth by as much as 1.1% per year.  Energy efficiency measures are estimated to create up to three times as many jobs as fossil fuel supply investments per dollar of investment.

A key recommendation of the Global Commission’s 2015 report was to scale up commitments by development banks working with governments and the private sector to invest at least US$1 trillion per year by 2030 in clean energy, including energy efficiency.

Air pollution

Outdoor air pollution, much of which is associated with fossil fuels, is linked to nearly 4 million premature deaths per year. In China, it is estimated that air pollution killed around 1.6 million people in China in 2013. In India, the air pollution toll in 2013 stood at 1.4 million deaths.  In Europe, coal plant emissions account for more than 18,200 premature deaths, about 8,500 new cases of chronic bronchitis, and over 4 million lost working days each year.  Analysis for the Global Commission shows that the health and mortality burden of air pollution amounts to as much as 4% or more of GDP in some countries. Recent analysis by the OECD has found that globally air pollution-related healthcare costs alone are projected to increase from US$21 billion in 2015 to US$176 billion in 2060.

Cities

It is estimated that by 2050, two-thirds of the global population will live in cities, and over 70% of the global demand for infrastructure over the next 15 years is expected to be in urban areas.  How cities develop is important both for growth and for climate change.  The report emphasizes that investment in sustainable infrastructure is essential to make cities inclusive, safe, and resilient.

Global Commission

The global commission is supported by governmental and private sector leaders: Sharan Burrow, General Secretary, International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), Australia; Suma Chakrabarti, President, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD); Helen Clark, Administrator, UN Development Programme (UNDP); Former Prime Minister of New Zealand; Jamshyd Godrej Chairman and Managing Director, Godrej & Boyce Mfg Co. Ltd., India; Stuart Gulliver, Group Chief Executive, HSBC Holdings plc and Chairman of The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation Limited; Angel Gurría, Secretary-General, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD); Chad O. Holliday, Chairman, Shell, United States; and Sri Mulyani Indrawati, Finance Minister of Indonesia

Should utilities be allowed to own distributed energy sources ?

At the Smart Gird Interoperability Panel 2016 Grid Modernization Summit in Washington DC the elephant in the room was whether utilities should be excluded from owning renewable power generation. It seemed the topic was so controversial that it was avoided to maintain harmony in the sessions.

In the U.S. electricity regulation is the responsibility of the states and there is a wide variation in regulation of the emerging electric power markets.  It is apparent to virtually all state regulators that under the impetus of distributed energy the utility industry is having to change its business model.  Because there are many different business models with which the 3,500 or so utilities are trying to meet the challenge of distributed energy,  many state regulators are finding it a challenge to create a new regulatory framework for this new energy world. 

In the 1990s and early 2000s a number of states decided to deregulate their electric power markets to encourage competition.  Typically this meant requiring incumbent utilities to divest their generation facilities and become regulated transmission and distribution entities.  Deregulation encouraged independent power retailers to enter the energy market.  It was hoped that deregulation would reduce costs and provide consumer choice.  In restructured states utilities are barred from owning power plants so that a competitive energy market could emerge.  Private energy providers have argued that the same rules should apply to distributed energy, so that utilities do not use their market power to dominate the renewable energy market.

According to the Edison Electric Institute in 1995 generation accounted for about two-thirds of the price of electricity. Today, the cost of generation is less than half of the price of electricity.  In many parts of the country the wholesale price of electricity has dropped significantly while the retail price has increased - in other words, electricity is cheap, the grid is expensive. This has resulted in disintermediation where large industrial and commercial customers in states with high regulated rates have shifted their power purchases to lower-cost energy providers or have decided to self-generate.

There is a lot of diversity among the alternative business models and regulation that are being adopted by the 3,500 utilities in the U.S.  At the SGIP conference, California, New York, and Texas were the states that were most often mentioned.

California

Utility-owned photovoltaic installations account for 52 percent of the solar capacity installed in the United States, according to the Solar Energy Industries Association. In California Southern California Edison (SCE) and PG&E have invested in utility-scale solar power plants, but they buy most of their renewable power from plants owned by private investors.  For example, the Ivanpah solar plant is owned by private investors including Google, and both PG&E and Southern Cal Edison have long term commitments to buy the plant's power.  California also encourages consumer rooftop solar through a net metering program that pays retail rates for solar PV power generated by consumers.

Sacramento Municipal Utilities District (SMUD) is one of the most forward-looking utilities in North America.  It was the first California utility to reach 20% renewable power and the first to commit to 33% renewables.  SMUD is moving from a centralized utility with a business model based on selling electricity to a distributed utility providing localized grid services.  SMUD is getting out of the business of selling electricity, and into the business of selling grid services. 

One of the most interesting innovations at SMUD is in the area of rate structure.  SMUD and other utilities are in the interesting position for a retailer of trying to sell less of its product, in this case electricity.  People are using less electricity as a result of personal interest as well as SMUD's own energy efficiency programs.  But the money has to come from somewhere.  SMUD has introduced a flat infrastructure fee.  Currently every customer pays $18/month for the grid, independent of how much power they consume.   SMUD has determined that $28 is the breakeven point, where the cost of maintaining the grid would be covered by infrastructure fees, and is moving towards that monthly change.
 
Another interesting innovation at SMUD is its solar power program.  Customers have the option to buy into solar power without having to install solar panels on their roofs.  The first solar program was a 1 MW solar PV program designed for residential customers.  The next was the recently opened 11 MW program for commercial customers.  The new solar plant at Rancho Seco Solar Power Plant is owned by D. E. Shaw Renewable Investments.  Power purchased from the project will provide energy for SMUD's commercial SolarShares® program. The SolarShares program is designed to provide business customers with a low-cost solar alternative to installing solar panels onsite.

Texas

In 1999, the Texas Legislature began restructuring the state’s electric industry which allowed consumers to begin choosing their retail electricity provider.  As of Dec. 31, 2001, deregulation of the ERCOT electricity markets required investor-owned utilities to unbundle their operations.  The provision of service to end-use retail customers became competitive.  There are over 100 retail electricity providers of which more than a  quarter offer a 100% renewable plan to their customers as an option.  Since 2002, approximately 85% of commercial and industrial consumers have switched power providers at least once. Approximately 40% of residential consumers in deregulated areas have switched from the former incumbent provider to a competitive retail energy provider.  One 2011 study found that Texas customers paid up to one-third less in 2010 compared to 2001 before competition and energy deregulation.

In 2007 TXU, the largest utility in the state, was acquired by a consortium and broken up into electricity distribution called Oncor Electric Delivery, power generation called Luminant, and an electricity retail provider TXU Energy without any electrical distribution or generation assets.

At the SGIP conference Cheryl Mele, Senior Vice President and Chief Operating Officer at ERCOT, pointed out that wind penetration has at times provided 48% of Texas power demand.  Over the past year wind provided 12% of all power generation.  Some electric utilities in Texas, most of whom participate in the ERCOT grid, invest in renewable energy generation.  For example, NRG Energy, an integrated energy company, owns wholly or partially 1.1 GW of wind and solar power. 

New York

The state that is getting the attention of state regulators is the New York Public Services Commission (PSC).  In the United States, a number of states have restructured their electric power industry with the goal of opening what has been a monopoly market to open competition.  In New York, the regulator PSC has been aggressive in changing regulation ("Reforming the Energy Vision" or REV) to promote a competitive electric power market. 

The New York Public Service Commission (NYPSC) has taken a major step toward a future of transactive energy.  New York's "Reforming the Energy Vision" (REV) is moving the New York state electric utility industry toward a radical redefinition of utilities as we have known them over the past hundred years since Tesla and Edison created the electric power industry.  In the future in New York State the utility industry will be comprised of distributed system platform (DSP) providers, basically providing the grid but not directly selling energy, and a competitive energy market with consumers and many energy providers including bulk power generators and distributed energy generators including you and me with rooftop solar panels.  This model has similarities with the UK model which is disrupting the traditional energy market in the UK..

An important implication of restructuring is that in restructured states, electric power utilities are typically restricted from owning distributed energy resources (DER) including wind, solarPV and battery storage.

In many of these states in response to policies promulgated by state regulators utilities in are increasingly looking at “non-wires alternatives” to address system overloads.  Non-wires alternatives include distributed energy generation (DER), demand response, energy efficiency and other non-traditional means to address system overloads instead of building conventional transmission and distribution infrastructure.  State regulators are asking utilities to use non-traditional solutions to address grid problems and in some cases utilities are asking the competitive market to come up with ideas. 

For example, ConEd and New York State Electric & Gas (NYSEG) circulated solicitations for non-wire alternatives.  ConEd is interested in demonstration projects to determine whether utilities can derive significant market-based benefits from integrating energy storage (utility-scale batteries) onto their electric systems.  ConEd has suggested that storage could reduce operating expenses, reduce peak demand for generation, manage distributed energy resources, or provide customer benefits, such as power quality or reduced risk of outages.  New York State Electric & Gas has issued a request for proposals for non-wires alternatives including distributed generation, demand response, energy efficiency, and energy storage that can reduce peak loading on a transformer bank. The utility hopes to defer an expensive upgrade to one of its substations.  In both cases the utilities have excluded fossil fuel proposals, except those that use natural gas or propane.

But if these solicitations involve distributed energy or storage, the PSC will only allow utilities to own distributed energy sources under very restrictive circumstances.

1. The utility issues a solicitation, but the market response is inadequate or too expensive
2. A project consists of energy storage on the utility's property and integrated into the utility's distribution system
3. A project will enable low or moderate income residential customers to benefit from the resource where markets are not likely to satisfy the need
4. A project is being sponsored for demonstration purposes.

For example, Consolidated Edison (ConEd) had an electrical overload problem in Brooklyn and Queens.  Instead of building a new substation estimated to cost $1 billion, it proposed a non-wires solution involving fostering the development of local energy sources, demand management and energy efficiency.  As part of the solution, ConEd planned to install battery storage on its own property.   In this special case the commission approved the storage ownership by ConEd because it would be on the utility’s property and integrated into its system.  But it reiterated that it will only allow utilities to own distributed energy resources when the open market does not offer a solution.

Midwest

In Illinois in 1997 the Customer Choice Act mandated that state utilities could no longer own generation facilities. During the Mandatory Transition Period 1997–2007, utilities were required to sell their electricity generation assets to other energy companies. Utilities no longer sold power and became responsible for delivering electricity only.  Since 2002 in the deregulated market, customers were permitted to buy electricity from competing retail electric providers.  In 2006 the Retail Electric Competition Act encouraged residential and small business customers to switch to alternative electric providers.

in July 1999, Ohio restructured its energy market to give consumers choice with their energy provider. The law took effect on January 1, 2001. Customers could now choose to buy energy from retail electric suppliers instead of automatically receiving it from the utility company (primarily AEP Ohio, Dayton Power & Light, Duke Energy, and FirstEnergy) in their area.  In May 2008, each incumbent utility was required to shed its power generation operations and become a purely electric distribution utility.

FirstEnergy, headquartered in Ohio and one of the largest investor-owned electric utilities in the U.S. with customers in Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Maryland, New Jersey, and New York, has just annnounced a strategic decision to exit the competitive power business not just in Ohio but in all its service territories. FirstEnergy is getting out of the business of generating and selling power and plans to become purely a regulated transmission and distribution entity.

Southeast

In the Southeast Duke Energy is a vertically integrated energy company with generation, transmission and distribution assets.  Duke Energy owns, operates or maintains renewable energy assets in its regulatory service territories and through Duke Energy Renewables. 

Since 2012, the Southern Company system has added or announced more than 4 GW of renewable generation.  Southern Power owns more than 1,600 megawatts of solar generating capacity at 26 facilities operating or under construction in California, Georgia, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina and Texas. Seventeen of these facilities are co-owned by third parties with Southern Power having the majority ownership.  Georgia Power, Southern subsidiary, is a national leader in solar energy. Georgia Power began offering rooftop solar to customers in July of 2015.  Alabama Power, another Southern subsidiary, is currently constructing two 10.6-megawatt solar facilities.

Florida has had a law for nearly a century that gives utilities a regional monopoly on power production. In some states solar companies like Solar City can install panels for free and then sell the power to the home or business owner at a rate lower than local utilities. These third-party sales are generally illegal under the Florida law that gives utility companies a local monopoly on supplying power.

Nevada

The Nevada Public Utility Commission has just re-established its previous, favorable rates for about 32,000 customers that already own rooftop solar panels in Nevada.  These solar customers had been facing a significant rate hike.  However, new solar customers will face the new rates that were changed in December.  Solar City and other solar providers have said that the new rates make it uneconomic for them to do business in the state.  NV Energy is developing its own solar energy sources, often together with large customers who have requested solar energy.  Three casinos opted to leave the grid, but the exit fees for leaving the NV Energy grid are so exorbitant that one of the casinos (Wynn) is opting to contest the fee in court.  Another casino opted to collaborate with NV Energy in the development of a solar PV farm.  The other casino (MGM) has opted to pay $86 million to leave the grid and rely on its own huge rooftop solar array on the Mandalay Bay and to buy the remainder of its power needs on the open market.

Summary

It should be clear that there are a lot of different approaches to creating, regulating and adopting a new business model among the 3,500 or so electric power utilities in the U.S.  A consensus on the way forward for U.S. utilities has not been reached and it appears that the different regions will likely end up with different business models and different regulatory policies.  It is clear that that whatever the business model and regulatory framework that are ultimately adopted in different regions, they all will have address the big issues of increasing customer choice, a growing array of consumer, commercial and industrial applications (hardware and software) that interact with the grid, distributed energy, microgrids which may or may not be connected to the grid and transactive energy.  Gartner has forecasted that by 2020 the largest electric power utility will be an Uber-like entity that will neither own infrastructure nor generate electricity, but will manage energy flows by putting energy producers together with energy consumers.

 

Revolution in the electric power industry: distributed energy and microgrids

Anne Pramaggiore, President and CEO of ComEd of Chicago, was the first at the Smart Gird Interoperability Panel 2016 Grid Modernization Summit in Washington DC to call the current business transformation that the electric power industry is experiencing a revolution.  But many other speakers agreed with this characterization.  Frequently mentioned were the regulatory and utility business transformations occurring in California and New York (REV).  Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) was mentioned as an example of a utility that was aggressively driving change in the utility business model. 

Robert Wilhite of Navigant Research pointed out that their recent research had found that 90% of utilities recognize that utility business models have to change.  But there are different opinions about the urgency of this transformation.  Navigant found that about half believe that it has to happen immediately, while the remainder believe it can happen later. 

Of course none of this would be possible without the enabling technology of the smart grid.  Dave Velazguez, President and CEO of Pepco, now part of Exelon, recollected that the first smart grid development at Pepco, by no means a laggard in adopting new technology, occurred only a decade ago.

Distributed energy

Virtually every speaker singled out distributed energy (DER), especially solarPV, as the main motivating driver that is forcing the business transformation of the utility industry.   Originally seen as a response to a warming climate, solarPV has achieved grid parity in several parts of the country and is seen as a way of providing customers not only with a choice of a green energy source but increasingly as a less expensive alternative to the local utility.   The price drop has been so substantial that even at a time of unusually low natural gas prices that are responsible for closing many coal-fired generation plants solarPV is achieving grid parity in many parts of North America.  Another important contributor to the revolution is the electrification of transportation, not only EVs but also buses, rail and even trucks.  

But none of this could have happened without the enabling platform of the smart grid.   The conjunction of technological advances in packet switched wired and wireless communications networks, intelligent electronic devices underlies the DER advances that have created choice for customers.  As we have seen previously in other industries such as telecom consumers have grasped the opportunity and are now beginning to drive changes in the energy market.

Microgrids

Another topic that came up repeatedly was microgrids.  Duke Energy has been running microgrid pilot for several years from which emerged the OpenFMB standard with an OpenFMB working group to support the effort. ComEd has five microgrid pilots and is starting the country's first microgrid cluster.  Pepco has two microgrid projects underway.

At the Distributech 2016 and at this SGIP Summit an implementation of OpenFMB demonstrated live by Green Energy Corp.  It was also announced at the summit that the source code was now available for download from the openFMB.io site. 

In addition a number of vendors were offering solutions for managing microgrids including the KEPCO Consortium from Korea who has built a comprehensive microgrid solution.

Geospatial

Although this was not a geospatially-focussed conference, GIS and geospatial technology came up in several areas.

Chanda Visweswanah, an IBM fellow, outlined in three topics what the the challenge is in transforming the grid.  First, there are several trends that are behaving exponentially, the number of sensors, the volume of data, and renewable energy sources were among them.  Secondly, we are increasingly relying on intermittent energy sources like wind and solarPV.  Third, this is not you grandmother's software.  This is software that provides a platform that supports sophisticated mathematical algorithms.  One of the most important of these are algorithms that nowcast and forecast weather at a very high resolution so that it is possible to predict wind velocity not at ground level but at the elevation of the turbines and at the location of the wind farm.  Similarly for insolation for solarPV.  These wind and insolation maps are effectively are the generation forecast minutes and hours in advance.

The Kepco Consortium demonstrated the μ-Grid platform.  Kepco have already partnered with PowerStream in Ontario to provide a utility-scale microgrid.  Earlier this year PowerStream and Kepco officially launched a utility-scaled Microgrid, which has the capacity to provide several hours of backup power supply for approximately 400 customers residing or owning a business in Penetanguishene. The Microgrid is helping to reinforce the existing grid by increasing resiliency and operational flexibility.  The platform provides a GIS Studio which allows grid 35 types of power facilities such as transformers to be visulaized and edited on a map, either imagery form satellites or overflights or a topographic map.

Another application of geloocation is in the area of cybersecurity where location is used by advanced cybersecurity applications for verifying identity.

Distributed intelligence

Several speakers pointed out that the volume of data has simply become to large for a centralized IT system that collects all the data at a central control point where analysis and visualization is performed.  By pushing intelligence out into the field, it reduces the data volumes that have to be handled at the central station and reduces the data flow over the network. 

Standards

Orange Button

Based on the very successful Green Button program, an important standards initiative is Orange Button.  It was initiated by the Department of Energy (DOE) with the objective of making it easier for investment to flow into solar power by standardizing electronic reporting of solar installation performance.  Orange Button targets a reduction in soft costs by streamlining the collection, security, management, exchange, and monetizing of solar datasets across the value chain of solar. It is expected that creating an industry-driven standardized data landscape will facilitate the growth and expansion of distributed solar. As the solar market continues to expand, it is critical that the collection, management, and exchange of solar datasets – especially those that affect the bankability (ability to secure loans for solar installations) of solar assets – are coordinated and streamlined to protect consumers, increase efficient pricing, and support new and existing businesses entering the solar marketplace. In April of this year four awardees (kWh Analytics, National Renewable Energy Laboratory,  Smart Grid Interoperability Panel, and SunSpec Alliance) were announced by the Department of Energy that will collaborate on the overall goal to standardize the way solar data is collected and exchanged.  SGIP was chosen to lead the effort.

At SGIP the effort is being led and coordinated by Dixon Wright of Wells Fargo.  Dixon is the only person that I was aware of representing a financial institution at the SGIP event.  I think that the presence of a major financial player such as Wells Fargo is a strong indication that solar is moving into the big leagues of financing. Dixon is passionate about the Orange Button initiative and believes that once a draft standard and implementation becomes available and a few users champion it, it will catch on rapidly with the large financial institutions and the solar industry.

OpenFMB

In March 2015, the Smart Grid Interoperability Panel (SGIP) formally kicked-off its OpenFMB effort to foster field interoperability drawing upon Duke Energy’s previous Coalition of the Willing I and Distributed Intelligence Platform work. By the 2015 SGIP Annual Conference in November, three microgrid use cases had been developed and demonstrated: optimization, unscheduled islanding, and grid reconnection.

In February 2016, the first OpenFMB reference implementation, utilizing SGIP’s microgrid use cases at Duke Energy’s Mount Holly microgrid test center, was demonstrated at the 2016 DistribuTECH Conference by Duke Energy’s Coalition of the Willing II (COW-II) vendor partners. For the annual SGIP Grid Modernization Summit in November 2016 the SGIP OpenFMB task force published a series of related foundational use cases that center on Distributed Energy Resources (DER) Circuit Segment Management for the active coordination of power systems equipment to DER, including a microgrid.  Green Energ Corp demonstrated an OpenFMB implementation connecting a solar PV installation with other equipment and applications.   This is an open source project and it was announced at the SGIP event that the source code is now available and can be downloaded from openfmb.io.  There is a free webinar replay "SGIP Grid Modernization Summit OpenFMB Demo Preview."  

Interoperability

Several speakers were on hand from the Department of Energy's Gris Modernization labs.  Since this was an SGIP event they focussed on the research underway at 13 Federal labs and 150 partner organizations that involves interoperability.  First of all research is underway to find a way to measure interoperability.  Secondly, there is an important initiative underwritten by several million dollars of financing to determine how to value interoperability.  If we can quantify the contribution it makes to business efficiencies by enhancing the opportunity for competitve products, by creating standards-based platforms that intelligent products from different vendors, whether smart meters, synchrophasors, reclosers, or substation components can plug and play with, that ultimately reduces prices for utilities, then it will be easier to justify and priorize greater investment  the standards and implementations that provide interoperability.

New research on the cost of hitting underground utilities

Important new research on the reliability of the generally available technology for detecting and gelocating underground utility infrastructure and the costs of hitting utilities during excavation (known as strikes in the UK) was presented at the Year in Infrastructure 2016 conference in London.   Dr. Nicole Metje, Professor of Geotechnical Engineering at the University of Birmingham,  presented some of her most recent research on a major problem affecting the construction industry worldwide.

Background: utility strikes in the UK

About 4 million excavations are carried out on the UK road network each year to install or repair buried utility pipes and cables. Not knowing the location of buried assets causes practical problems that increase costs and delay projects, but more importantly, it increases the risk of injury for utility owners, contractors and road users. The problems associated with inaccurate location of buried pipes and cables are serious and are rapidly worsening due to the increasing density of underground infrastructure in major urban areas.  In the U.S. it is estimated that an underground utility is hit about every minute and underground utility conflicts and relocations are the number one cause for project delays during road construction.

The standard tools in the U.K. for detecting underground utilities are the cable avoidance tool known as CAT. The CAT can detect signals naturally radiating from metallic services or in conjunction with a Genny that applies a distinctive signal that the CAT can detect.  The adoption of ground penetrating radar is increasing, but compared to CAT it remains relatively expensive and requires trained operators.

Underground asset detection is the last frontier of remote sensing.  In the U.K. it has been perceived as a serious problem since at least a decade ago.  The Mapping the Underworld (MTU) project was initiated in 2004 to develop a multi-sensor platform to locate and map in 3-D the location of all buried utility assets - without excavation.  The 10-year research program, which was largely funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), involves the University of Birmingham, University of Bath, British Geological Society, Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), Univeristy of Leeds, Newcastle University, University of Sheffield, University of Southampton, and UKWIR. The project concluded that a combination of multiple technologies is essential for the reliable detection of the buried assets.   The project aimed to develop a remote sensing platform that combined several detection technologies together with software that optimizes the combined data.  To achieve a 100% location success rate without disturbing the ground is the 'holy grail' of underground remote sensing.   The benefits of knowing where underground infrastructure are well documented.

Since then, a second major multi-disciplinary, multi-university research project, Assessing the Underworld (ATU) has been funded,  largely by the EPSRC. The project aims to create prototype multi-sensor devices that will enable the condition of underground assets to be assessed remotely without excavation.  The technologies include above ground remote sensing and robotic devices that can be deployed in a water distribution or sewer pipeline.

In 2012 the U.K. the civil engineering contractor's association CECA conducted a survey of its members on the topic of underground strikes.  It asked questions about the technologies used and whether the respondent has internal processes for tracking and estimating the costs associated with utility strikes.  I have paraphrased the questions.

Does your organization quantify the direct costs of utility strikes on a regular basis ?	Yes 57%	No 43%
Do you track and quantify other costs (indirect and/or social) incurred during service strikes ?	Yes 29%	No 71%
Do you have a separate programam or project for determing and recording the location of underground utilities  program  ?	Yes 14%	No 86%
Does your field staff use a Genny as much as it should be ?	Yes 14%	No 86%
Do you think underground utilities would still be damaged during excavation if your staff used a Genny as often as it could be ?	Yes 0%	No 100%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This suggests that even the limited (see below) tools available today for underground detection are not used to their fullest extent.  The direct costs of utility strikes are still not quantified and tracked in many firms, and very few firms are aware of the indirect costs associated with utility strikes.  Probably as a result of not knowing the costs, very few firms have an explicit program for geolocating underground utilities.

Risk of underground utility strikes

Dr. Metje presented new results based on her research on utility strikes in the U.K.  She pointed put that unlike the U.S. where collecting statistics on underground hits is relatively easy, in the U.K. it is a challenge.  In spite of the obstacles, she managed to collect data on 3348 strikes defined as incidents during excavation which involved damage to underground utilities.  Some of the very interesting results of the analysis include

• Of 255 strikes where pre-excavation CAT scans had been carried out, in 52% of the cases the utility had been detected before the strike.
• Of 187 strikes where utility plans/drawings (as-builts) had been reviewed before excavation, in 48% of the cases the utilities hit were shown on the plans. 
• Of 89 strikes where the plans/drawings (as-builts) showed the utility,  in 84% of the cases respondents reported that the location of the utility was inaccurately plotted.   16% said it was accurate.

In other words even when it is known that there is utility infrastructure underground, there is still a very significant risk of hitting it - perhaps because its location is not known accurately enough.  It also provides further evidence that, in general, as-builts cannot be relied on, either because they are "as-designed" or because they have not been maintained and do not record modifications that may have been made since the infrastructure was first built.

Cost of hitting underground utilities

Dr. Metje presented important results on the direct costs of utility strikes in the U.K.

Electricity	£ 970
Gas	£485
Telecom	£400
Fibre-optic	£2800
Water	£300-980

 

 

 

 

 

However, Dr. Metje has found that the true costs associated with utility strikes is much higher than this. Direct costs include the costs of sending a crew to assess and repair the damaged pipe or cable.  Indirect costs include the impact of traffic disruption as  a result of the strike, any injuries and other impacts on the health of the workers directly involved or people in the immediate neighbourhood, and the lost custom that businesses would have experienced as a result of the traffic disruption.  Dr Metje's research suggests that the true cost much larger than the direct cost.  Her estimate is that the true cost is about 30 times the direct cost.  This is a startling result which indicates that the cost to society of underground utility strikes is much, much larger than is generally believed. 

Reliability of underground utility detection

In the U.S. the ASCE 38-02 - Standard Guideline for the Collection and Depiction of Existing Subsurface Utility Data is widely used for classifying location information about underground infrastructure according to its estimated reliability.  I've blogged about a major national project in France aimed at classifying information about all of France's underground utility infrastructure according to a standard that specifies absolute accuracy (< 40 cm, 40 cm - 1.5 m, >1.5 m).

In the U.K. Publicly Available Specification (PAS) 128 governs the recording of the location of underground utilities.  PAS 128 was developed under the auspices of the British Standards Institution (BSI) and sponsored by the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE).  PAS 128 is aimed at the practitioner - surveyors who make their living detecting and reporting the location of underground utilties for construction contractors and utilities.  The primary objective is to reduce risk for construction contractors.  In the UK, unlike the U.S. and Canada where we have one-call centres, in the U.K. if a utility is disrupted by a construction project, the liability lies entirely with the contractor. 

PAS128 has aspects of both the U.S. and French system.  It is similar to the US ASCE standard in that codes (A) through (D) relates to how the location was captured.  The British standard is different in that it adds sub-categories B1 through B4 which specify the absolute precision of the remote-sensed location.

    QL D - Location of underground structures determined by a review of existing utility (paper) records
    QL C - A physical reconnaissance of the site has been performed identifying features of the network are visible above ground
    QL B - Remote detection technology such as electromagnetic or ground penetrating radar have been used to detect the location of the underground facilities. There is a sub-classfication B1-B4 that specifies  the estimated precision of the measurements.  For example, B3 corresponds to +/- 0.5 meters.
    QL A - Verification, typically by potholing

Dr. Metje reported revealing research aimed at assessing the PAS128 standard and also validating the reliability of the MTU (Mapping The Underworld) sensor technologies on a site where underground truth could be determined.   Five commercial companies were invited to conduct a utility survey of the chosen area to PAS128 standard.  The firms were asked to survey the underground utilities in the same area and report location in the form of a map.  This was compared with the results of a survey conducted with the MTU platform.  The firms agreed on the location of wastewater and storm sewers and water utilities (pipes).  But in the case of the location of telecom and electric cables there was substantial disagreement - the total length of telecom and electricity cables detected by different firms varied widely, from 90 to 240 meters.  This is a startling indication of the risk associated with existing underground utility detection technologies.

A new standard relating to underground utility detection is expected to be released in early 2017.  PAS 256 (Buried services – Collection, recording and sharing of location information data – Code of Practice) governs data sharing. 

Source:

WHAT DO UTILITY STRIKES REALLY COST?
Authors: Dr. Lewis Makana, Dr. Nicole Metje, Prof. Ian Jefferson, and Prof. Chris Rogers, University of Birmingham, 2016.