Open systems for the electric utility industry: what, why and how ?

The utility industry is trying to understand open systems and its implications to their day-to-day operations. While a clear and concise definition of the term is not available, the advantages of moving to open systems seem numerous. The published literature in this area has, so far, focused on certain parts of the open system concept. However, the published literature has not yet provided an overall picture which takes into consideration all the aspects of open systems which in reality goes much beyond the individual components of a computing system. This paper has attempted to clear that picture. The authors understand that the area of open systems is not yet totally defined. The definition process is going to continue for some time into the future. However, the mainstream computer industry already has certain ideas regarding the directions that will be taken during the definition process. Organizations that typically invest vast quantities of money into the acquisition of computing resources, (either for EMS systems or for the corporate information networks) need to be aware of these directions. This paper provides information about those directions and provides more information about “What Utilities should do to be ready for these changes”