Remote Power Outage Detection Using Customer Premise Equipment
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Solution Overview
Problem
Power outages in electrical grids often result in delayed detection, isolation of causes, and restoration due to reactive response methods, leading to increased operational and maintenance costs for power providers.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a remote power outage and restoration notification system that uses customer premise equipment to send alerts to a network management server, which detects outages and notifications to power providers, enabling proactive response and reducing restoration time and costs.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Loss of time
If power providers use reactive response methods based on customer calls to detect outages, then operational costs are reduced, but outage detection time and restoration time increase
Solution Approach 1:
The customer premise equipment automatically detects power outages and sends notifications to the power provider without requiring customer action. The system serves itself by monitoring its own power status and initiating the notification process autonomously, eliminating the need for reactive customer calls while maintaining operational simplicity.
Solution Approach 2:
The customer premise equipment continuously monitors power availability and prepares to notify the power provider before the outage fully impacts service. By detecting the absence of power and initiating notification automatically, the system performs the detection action preliminarily, reducing the time between actual outage occurrence and provider awareness.
2Productivity
If power providers rely on physical inspections by field force personnel to confirm restoration, then accurate verification is achieved, but restoration confirmation time and operational costs increase
Solution Approach 1:
The customer premise equipment continuously monitors power availability and automatically sends restoration notifications to the power provider when power is detected. This creates a feedback loop where the system verifies restoration status electronically, providing both speed (automatic notification) and reliability (continuous monitoring confirms actual power return) without requiring physical inspections.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces the mechanical system of physical inspections by field personnel with an electronic monitoring and notification system. The customer premise equipment uses electronic sensors to detect power status and transmits data automatically, substituting human physical verification with automated electronic detection, thereby increasing both speed and consistency of restoration confirmation.
3Ease of operation
If power providers implement automated remote notification systems, then outage detection and restoration confirmation speed increase, but system complexity and initial costs increase
Solution Approach 1:
The customer premise equipment performs multiple functions: it monitors power availability, detects outages, sends notification alerts to the power provider, and confirms restoration. By making the existing customer equipment multi-functional, the system achieves automated outage management without adding separate dedicated devices, thereby improving ease of operation while limiting the increase in overall system complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent merges the outage detection, notification, and restoration confirmation functions into the existing customer premise equipment rather than implementing them as separate systems. This consolidation leverages existing infrastructure and devices, reducing the need for additional complex components while achieving automated outage management efficiency.
Data Source
AI summary
Power outages and restorations at customer premises can be automatically detected and reported. A method may include receiving, from a network terminal, a first notification associated with a power outage; retrieving location information associated with the network terminal; sending a second notification indicating that the outage has occurred and that includes the location information associated with the network terminal; retrieving prior outage information that corresponds to a set of network terminals associated with a group of set top boxes; determining that an outage event is triggered, when a quantity of outages is greater than a threshold, where the quantity of outages is based on the outage and other outages obtained from the prior outage information; and sending a third notification based on the determination that the outage event is triggered.