Power grid operator banks on high-tech for work resumption

China Southern Power Grid is reinforcing its grid network by leveraging big data, artificial intelligence and cloud services among other cutting-edge technologies.

The move also aligns with the State Council's call for new infrastructure development, including industrial internet and artificial intelligence, to offset the economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic and boost sustainable growth.

Yunnan Power Grid Co, CSG's unit in the southwestern Chinese province, has developed a system to collect data regarding electricity use from companies as an important indicator of their production resumption situation.

Since the system's launch in February, it has become an important part of work-resumption-related policymaking for the Yunnan government and also helped the province roll out measures to contain the pandemic.

"To date, CSG has integrated data from customs and exports, transportation and finance to its self-developed electricity data platform, conducted analyses and provided examples of work-resumption-related policymaking for governments," said Chen Qingming from the data research and development center of CSG Media Co Ltd.

According to CSG, this year the company aims to have its data center updated to the cloud, uplift the service level of its data center and strengthen management over data assets. The company also wants to improve real-time access to its data center and create more value among its data resources.

Aside from using big data to help governments with policymaking, CSG is also leveraging its data analysis strengths to help enterprise customers troubleshoot equipment and offer customized services.

Staff at CSG's Guizhou Power Grid Co successfully examined equipment problems on the user end. CSG's Guangxi Power Grid Co also has a data monitoring center to help the company offer customized services based on user need.

In addition to big data, CSG's AI also plays an important role in guaranteeing safe production and stable electricity supply amid the pandemic.

During the outbreak, Guizhou Power Grid had a total of 14 substation intelligent inspection robots "on duty". The robots have performed more than 500 inspection tasks, inspected over 200,000 working points and found one defect in substation equipment.

According to Guizhou Power Grid, the adoption of the robots has effectively reduced the possibility of human inspectors risking cross-infection and eliminated possible equipment problems in a more timely manner.

CSG's Hainan Power Grid Co also adopted a digital power grid platform and a matching maintenance system.

The self-developed digital platform is able to conduct full-time monitoring on equipment maintenance to achieve more orderly operation, and once the maintenance is completed, the platform will file a report to its users and resume power supply.

This year, CSG aims to step up efforts promoting AI use in the grid network, including intelligent image recognition, automatic drone inspection, cable tunnel robot inspections and fiber optic monitoring.

CSG will also launch a pilot for Beidou satellite high-precision positioning, drone cluster operations and amphibious robot inspection operations. The goal is to build smart electricity transmission lines that are safe, reliable and efficient.

Aside from big data and AI, CSG also utilized its cloud computing technologies to offer contactless services to its clients to avoid contagion.

Su Kai, deputy head of operations division under marketing department at CSG's Guangdong Power Grid Co, said the company's online system allows users to upload information by a simple scan. "In the past, users had to write down information including ID numbers, bank accounts and business licenses."

During the coronavirus outbreak, CSG has dealt with 421,000 power supply cases, of which 99 percent are settled online.

Tang Guoliang, general manager for customer service in CSG's marketing department, said the company plans to have all of its businesses go online through cloud technology.