Dominion Virginia Power ties up with Elster

Dominion Virginia Power, a subsidiary of Dominion, has chosen Elster's EnergyAxis System Smart Grid Solution for use in the utility's recently announced energy conservation plans.

In 2009, Dominion plans to deploy 200,000 smart meters as part of a large demonstration programme of smart grid technology in urban and rural areas of Dominion's service territory. Dominion expects to improve customer service and business operations through advanced system control, real-time outage notification, and power quality monitoring.

As part of this programme, Dominion is deploying a number of smart thermostats with the EnergyAxis System for a residential critical peak pricing pilot this summer. Dominion will measure customer responsiveness to changing energy prices and the impact on energy demand during peak usage periods.

Dominion's plans for using EnergyAxis System strengthens a long-standing relationship between Dominion and the smart metering and smart grid system solutions company.

As per the information available, Dominion Virginia Power plans to invest about $600 million to create a "smart" electric grid that it said will produce environmental benefits while providing customers with substantial cost savings. The smart grid is part of a larger conservation plan, called "Powering Virginia". The company hopes to begin implementing programmes next year.

The smart grid will allow energy to be delivered more efficiently and will result in significant energy savings by allowing more precise control of the energy flow, Dominion said.It plans to replace all of its existing electric meters with Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI), capable of two-way communications, as well as additional equipment to monitor and control the electric distribution system.