Aclara TWACS chosen by Idaho Power for AMI

ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI - The TWACS power-line communications solution, one of the Aclara-brand technologies of ESCO Technologies Inc., St. Louis, has been selected by Idaho Power for its proposed advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) project.

Idaho Power is involved in the generation, purchase, transmission, distribution and sale of electric energy in a 24,000-square-mile area in southern Idaho and eastern Oregon, serving approximately 500,000 metered endpoints.

Idaho Power initially deployed the TWACS power-line solution several years ago with a 25,000 unit deployment intended to substantiate the business case for AMI and to test customer response to time-of-use billing and demand response/load control programs.

The successful performance of this technology over the past few years was a significant factor in Idaho PowerÂ’s decision to expand to a system-wide TWACS deployment.

Idaho Power plans to purchase the most advanced TWACS meter modules to collect interval data for current billing needs and to support planned time-of-use billing and demand response programs that are designed to allow the utility and its customers to better manage energy consumption and related energy costs.

The total value of purchase orders anticipated to be issued under this contract is approximately $25 million and the system is expected to be deployed over a three-year period beginning in early 2009.

Bruce Kessler, president of Aclara Power-Line Systems Inc., commented, “We are pleased that Idaho Power has decided to expand its existing TWACS installation to meet its AMI needs within its vast service territory. We believe Aclara’s versatile, proven-at-scale power-line solution is the most cost-effective AMI system for utilities such as Idaho Power, which have both rural and urban service areas, to collect meter data and to provide advanced demand response and time-of-use programs to meet customers’ energy needs today and well into the future.”