More than 1,000 util­i­ties indus­try experts, pro­fes­sion­als, and lead­ers gath­ered in Mia­mi, Flori­da, last week for the SAP for Util­i­ties, Pre­sent­ed by ASUG conference.

Con­nec­tion and net­work­ing were crit­i­cal com­po­nents of the event, which returned this year for its 17^th edi­tion, as atten­dees sought knowl­edge and exper­tise to tack­le seis­mic indus­try changes spurred by evolv­ing cus­tomer expec­ta­tions, grow­ing reg­u­la­to­ry and sus­tain­abil­i­ty demands, and ever-shift­ing tech­nol­o­gy solutions.

The impor­tance of facil­i­tat­ing the ener­gy tran­si­tion took cen­ter stage as speak­ers and atten­dees dis­cussed how tech­nol­o­gy solu­tions — such as SAP S/4HANA, cloud envi­ron­ments, and arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence (AI) — play a key role in help­ing util­i­ties’ lead­ers trans­form tra­di­tion­al pow­er gen­er­a­tion, grow renew­able gen­er­a­tion and stor­age capac­i­ty, and hard­en the elec­tric grid.

“This ener­gy tran­si­tion we’re nav­i­gat­ing is a shared mis­sion,” Michael Sul­li­van, Nation­al Vice Pres­i­dent of Renew­able Ener­gy and Util­i­ties at SAP North Amer­i­ca, told atten­dees dur­ing a fire­side chat with Geoff Scott, ASUG CEO & Chief Com­mu­ni­ty Cham­pi­on. ​“We’re a part of some­thing big­ger than our­selves, and even the small parts we play mat­ter sig­nif­i­cant­ly in the long run.”

Read our exclu­sive inter­view with Sul­li­van on process opti­miza­tion, data inter­op­er­abil­i­ty in the cloud, and much more.

SAP for Util­i­ties, Pre­sent­ed by ASUG pro­vid­ed crit­i­cal net­work­ing and knowl­edge shar­ing expe­ri­ences, for atten­dees to learn how their peers are tack­ling indus­try chal­lenges and lever­ag­ing SAP tech­nolo­gies to improve oper­a­tions and dri­ve innovation.

“ASUG is not just about today’s util­i­ties com­mu­ni­ty. It’s about con­nect­ing with each oth­er and learn­ing from each oth­er year-round,” said Scott, fur­ther under­lin­ing the long-term nature of the ​“tec­ton­ic shifts” the util­i­ties indus­try is experiencing.

Con­fronting Mod­ern Util­i­ties Challenges

Among the even­t’s themes was the imper­a­tive to over­come indus­try-spe­cif­ic hur­dles by lever­ag­ing evolv­ing enter­prise tech­nol­o­gy. As the effects of cli­mate change become more appar­ent, and reg­u­la­to­ry stan­dards neces­si­tate opti­miza­tion of inef­fi­cient tech­nol­o­gy sys­tems and busi­ness process­es, many orga­ni­za­tions are deter­min­ing how best to facil­i­tate a tran­si­tion to sus­tain­able ener­gy while also updat­ing aging grid infrastructure.

These tasks will require mon­u­men­tal effort, poten­tial­ly span gen­er­a­tions — and at times can seem insur­mount­able. How­ev­er, dur­ing his celebri­ty keynote, Mick Ebel­ing, CEO and Founder of Not Impos­si­ble Labs, empha­sized that ​“every­thing that sur­rounds us right now that’s pos­si­ble was at one point impos­si­ble.” He encour­aged atten­dees to empow­er their teams to tack­le chal­lenges that, though daunt­ing, could ulti­mate­ly change the face of their indus­try, and to do so by main­tain­ing faith in the long-term val­ue of hav­ing lofty ambitions.

Ref­er­enc­ing the remark­able projects Not Impos­si­ble Labs has worked on — includ­ing help­ing an artist par­a­lyzed by ALS to draw again and design­ing low-cost pros­thet­ic arms for dou­ble amputees — Ebel­ing dis­cussed how encour­ag­ing teams to cre­ative­ly approach seem­ing­ly impos­si­ble tasks will lead to major breakthroughs.

Read our exclu­sive inter­view with Ebel­ing on redefin­ing the art of the pos­si­ble and Not Impos­si­ble Labs’ track record of excellence.

Dur­ing their fire­side chat, which kicked off the conference’s sec­ond day, Scott and Sul­li­van dis­cussed spe­cif­ic indus­try hur­dles and changes that atten­dees are expe­ri­enc­ing while reflect­ing on the impor­tance of indus­try-wide net­work­ing and com­mu­ni­ca­tion to solve indus­try-wide issues.

“We should all be think­ing about that con­flu­ence of new tech­nol­o­gy, this mas­sive chal­lenge of ener­gy tran­si­tion we’re all set up to solve, and that we have this great com­mu­ni­ty to do it with,” Sul­li­van said. Specif­i­cal­ly, Sul­li­van sin­gled out sev­er­al tech­nol­o­gy shifts tak­ing place in the indus­try. As util­i­ty com­pa­nies move to the cloud, imple­ment SAP S/4HANA, and lever­age solu­tions like AI, set­ting a foun­da­tion with­in one’s busi­ness to effec­tive­ly lever­age those solu­tions is critical.

Accord­ing to Sul­li­van, the adop­tion of a clean core data mod­el is vital to enter­pris­es seek­ing to use these solu­tions. Addi­tion­al­ly, Sul­li­van dis­cussed the decar­boniza­tion of ener­gy resources. Giv­en the increas­ing impact of cli­mate change across all indus­tries, util­i­ties are at work con­sid­er­ing how to build more sus­tain­able, ener­gy-effi­cient grids — and lever­ag­ing AI will be crit­i­cal to meet­ing this challenge.

“The AI you’re using today is the worst AI you’ll ever use,” he reflect­ed. ​“This is going to accel­er­ate.” That said, abid­ing by prin­ci­ples of respon­si­ble, rel­e­vant, and reli­able AI will be essen­tial for util­i­ties seek­ing to extract val­ue from gen­er­a­tive-AI invest­ments, and the posi­tion of SAP is that AI will only be use­ful if it is ingrained in spe­cif­ic busi­ness con­texts and processes.

“The val­ue from AI is not auto­mat­ic,” Sul­li­van said. ​“The val­ue will be achieved at the inter­sec­tion of busi­ness process and data.”

Util­i­ties of the Future

Oper­a­tions, infor­ma­tion, soft­ware, bit­coin min­ing ener­gy con­sump­tion, and advanced dis­tri­b­u­tion man­age­ment sys­tems (ADMS) came into focus dur­ing a sub­se­quent pan­el, mod­er­at­ed by Mark Hol­lis, Indus­try Exec­u­tive Advi­sor at SAP, that reflect­ed on the inter­sec­tion of these top­ics while shar­ing expert insights into how util­i­ties can pre­pare for a fast-evolv­ing future.

“Our ceil­ing should be the next generation’s floor, which is where we’re head­ing if we do this cor­rect­ly,” Hol­lis reflected. 

For more than a cen­tu­ry, ener­gy flowed in one direc­tion; now, with renew­able ener­gy such as solar and bat­tery stor­age direct­ing pow­er back into the grid, that’s no longer the case. Dis­trib­uted ener­gy rep­re­sents a sig­nif­i­cant shift for util­i­ties, and account­ing for mul­ti-way pow­er flows through flex­i­ble ener­gy gen­er­a­tion and stor­age capa­bil­i­ties will require com­plex strate­gies and process­es to con­nect renew­able ener­gy projects to the grid.

Jason Han­d­ley, Gen­er­al Man­ag­er of the Dis­trib­uted Ener­gy Group, Duke Ener­gy, is focused on con­nect­ing new elec­tric­i­ty gen­er­a­tors to the elec­tric grid and opti­miz­ing the dis­tri­b­u­tion inter­con­nect process. ​“It’s no longer a util­i­ty send­ing ener­gy down the line,” he explained. ​“It’s about coor­di­nat­ing that back-and-forth.”

Read our exclu­sive inter­view with Duke Ener­gy on the impor­tance of cross-orga­ni­za­tion­al col­lab­o­ra­tion and change man­age­ment strate­gies in lever­ag­ing RISE with SAP for dig­i­tal transformation.

To man­age the inter­con­nec­tion process safe­ly and reli­ably, util­i­ty-con­nect­ed dis­trib­uted ener­gy resource (DER) projects must be assessed to deter­mine what new trans­mis­sion equip­ment or upgrades may be required for a project to con­nect to the grid.

Col­lab­o­rat­ing with a reg­u­la­to­ry com­mis­sion, Duke Ener­gy is focused on eval­u­at­ing these projects through a series of impact stud­ies, known as Defin­i­tive Inter­con­nec­tion Sys­tem Impact Stud­ies (DSIS), to iden­ti­fy poten­tial sys­tem con­straints, tran­sient insta­bil­i­ties, and over­du­tied equip­ment asso­ci­at­ed with con­nect­ing gen­er­a­tion to the trans­mis­sion system.

Han­d­ley not­ed that ​“deploy, deploy, deploy” can be a chal­leng­ing imper­a­tive for util­i­ties that have been his­tor­i­cal­ly mea­sured through cus­tomer-ser­vice met­rics. Mean­while, keep­ing pace with the demand to con­nect renew­able ener­gy projects to the grid can’t come at the expense of reli­a­bil­i­ty. But the inter­con­nec­tion process will require util­i­ties to col­lab­o­rate on a set of stan­dards and prac­tices for con­nect­ing DER projects to the elec­tric grid. 

“We, as an indus­try, have to coa­lesce around DER stan­dards, to under­stand prod­uct com­pat­i­bil­i­ty, how we roll out soft­ware, and how we expand field ser­vice man­age­ment capa­bil­i­ties,” Han­d­ley said.

This presents anoth­er area for inno­va­tion. Bri­an Hoff, VP Prod­uct Man­age­ment, GE Ver­no­va, is focused on ener­gy pro­duc­tion and man­u­fac­tur­ing through sus­tain­able ener­gy solu­tions, intend­ed to accel­er­ate the ener­gy tran­si­tion. A major com­po­nent of suc­cess with the ener­gy tran­si­tion, Hoff stat­ed, will involve grid orches­tra­tion via a fit-to-stan­dard approach to soft­ware and sys­tems. In work­ing with more than 800 util­i­ties cus­tomers, Hoff has come to believe that ​“every­body has sim­i­lar prob­lems, and we’re more sim­i­lar than we realize.”

Adam Swick, Chief Growth Offi­cer at Marathon Dig­i­tal Hold­ings, a cryp­tocur­ren­cy min­ing firm, reflect­ed on the trans­for­ma­tive poten­tial of bit­coin min­ing with­in the ener­gy sec­tor. With 13 data cen­ters across four con­ti­nents, Marathon has part­nered with util­i­ties to man­age its own huge­ly ener­gy-inten­sive process­es. One recent pilot project: recy­cling heat from data cen­ters to warm a com­mu­ni­ty in Fin­land. ​“Giv­en the pow­er inten­si­ty of the com­pute, we pro­duce recov­er­able heat,” Swick explained, reflect­ing that beyond the envi­ron­men­tal and eco­nom­ic ben­e­fits of heat recy­cling, he sees this project as indica­tive of the role that dig­i­tal data cen­ters have to play in cre­at­ing a sus­tain­able future. Heat recy­cling could also open a new rev­enue stream for Marathon, a win-win as the cryp­tocur­ren­cy min­ing firm explores its future in the util­i­ties space.

The Impor­tance of Orga­ni­za­tion­al Change Management

As util­i­ties brace for the future and adopt new tech­nol­o­gy solu­tions to help over­come mod­ern chal­lenges, they must first ensure their orga­ni­za­tions are ready to embrace new solu­tions. Through­out the con­fer­ence, the impor­tance of prop­er, well-fund­ed orga­ni­za­tion­al change man­age­ment (OCM) strate­gies was emphasized.

Dur­ing large-scale dig­i­tal trans­for­ma­tion projects, OCM plans are often an after­thought, which results in end user con­fu­sion and an unsat­is­fac­to­ry solu­tion roll­out. How­ev­er, end users are crit­i­cal to count­less util­i­ties oper­a­tions, includ­ing asset main­te­nance and instal­la­tion. Ensur­ing these employ­ees under­stand how dig­i­tal trans­for­ma­tion projects impact their roles, and the right way to uti­lize new solu­tions in the field, is essen­tial for mod­ern­iza­tion to succeed.

In a ses­sion focused on the Salt Riv­er Project (SRP) cus­tomer mod­ern­iza­tion pro­gram, Jes­si­ca Bar­chak, Busi­ness Inte­gra­tion Man­ag­er at Salt Riv­er Project, and Valerie Pomerenke, Direc­tor of Cus­tomer Mod­ern­iza­tion at Salt Riv­er Project, empha­sized the impor­tance of ded­i­cat­ed OCM strate­gies and resources played in the program.

“It’s nev­er too ear­ly to bring in your OCM lead,” Bar­chak told atten­dees, under­lin­ing that these strate­gies often take a large amount of work dur­ing the pre-plan­ning phase. As enter­pris­es engage OCM pro­fes­sion­als ear­ly, Bar­chak sug­gest­ed that enter­pris­es be pre­pared to start ded­i­cat­ed OCM resources — such as web­sites, train­ings, and FAQs — ear­ly to head off confusion.

Mov­ing For­ward Together

Through­out the con­fer­ence, across deep-dive learn­ing-lab ses­sions and cus­tomer-sto­ry pre­sen­ta­tions alike, atten­dees gained insights into how they can lever­age SAP tech­nol­o­gy to embrace the future and improve the North Amer­i­can util­i­ties indus­try. How­ev­er, to gal­va­nize last­ing change, util­i­ty com­pa­nies must remain com­mit­ted to learn­ing from one another.

The SAP for Util­i­ties, Pre­sent­ed by ASUG con­fer­ence gave atten­dees a plat­form to share expe­ri­ences, and a venue to learn from their peers. Marc Rosson, Enter­prise Archi­tect at Sno­homish PUD, not­ed dur­ing one of the ses­sions that peer-to-peer knowl­edge shar­ing is crit­i­cal for the entire sec­tor to con­front future challenges.

Read our exclu­sive inter­view with Rosson, a not­ed util­i­ties thought leader, on the state of the util­i­ties industry.

The util­i­ties indus­try must work togeth­er in order to move for­ward and dri­ve sig­nif­i­cant change, whether in terms of pow­er gen­er­a­tion, elec­tric grid inter­con­nec­tion, or broad­er oper­a­tional effi­cien­cy, he said.

“We are cur­rent­ly fig­ur­ing out how util­i­ties can par­tic­i­pate in solv­ing these gen­er­a­tional chal­lenges the world is fac­ing,” Rosson sep­a­rate­ly told ASUG. ​“It’s excit­ing to be a part of the indus­try that’s solv­ing prob­lems. I’m opti­mistic about the future, and I’m excit­ed to be doing my part.”

Stay tuned to ASUG for more util­i­ties-spe­cif­ic sto­ries in the com­ing weeks.